Can the Vols get emotional for Louisiana Tech?

Florida was coming to town.

This week, Tennessee is preparing for a team it has played only once in its football history and a game that has no bearing on the SEC.

Louisiana Tech is coming to town.

So how to do the Vols motivate for practice?

"It's not hard at all," free safety Jason Allen said Tuesday. "We made a lot of mistakes against Florida. We have to correct those mistakes. Louisiana Tech has a great football team.

"They have a great running back, some nice receivers, a nice quarterback also. So we've got to go out and execute, whether we're playing Louisiana Tech or Florida or Georgia or whoever."

Louisiana Tech (2-1), which joined the Western Athletic Conference in 2001, lost at No. 4 Miami, 48-0, on Saturday.

The Bulldogs opened the season with home victories against Nevada (38-21) and Louisiana-Lafayette (24-20).

Tennessee pulled out a 30-28 thriller over Florida on Saturday in another memorable game of a series that stirs all kinds of emotions.

Can the Vols get emotional for Louisiana Tech?

"It's not hard for us to get up for them at all because it's the next opponent," tailback Gerald Riggs said. "We look at everything that was last week as last week. What we've got to worry about is the next team up. It doesn't matter who it is.

"We're going to go out there and play it because in order for us to get to our ultimate goal, we've got 11 stops, and those 11 stops we have to get wins out of each one of them, and each one is as important as the next."

Louisiana Tech junior Ryan Moats is averaging 198.3 yards per game and 7.3 yards per carry. He rushed for 257 yards in each of the first two games and rushed for 81 yards against Miami.

Moats may keep the Vols from looking ahead to the Oct. 2 game against Auburn and the Oct. 9 game against Georgia.

"It's a lot riding on this," defensive end Turk McBride said. "We just want to stay focused. Louisiana Tech is a great team. They have a great offensive line and an extremely great running back and a talented quarterback (junior Donald Allen).

"We're looking at them just like we looked at Florida, as another team we have to go against."

Allen said, "They're a good team. We don't sleep on any team. If you sleep on any team, they can easily come in and beat you. It doesn't matter if you're playing an SEC team or a team from any conference."