Sharing a rented riverboat with ESPN's Gameday crew didn't float for Tennessee athletic director Mike Hamilton.

That was one of the options the Vols' had for Saturday's upcoming game at LSU.

It just wasn't the best one for a 7:45 p.m. kickoff against the Tigers.

Tennessee instead will fly to Baton Rouge the day of the game, leaving around mid-morning from Knoxville.

"ESPN called us Wednesday or Thursday of last week and said they were renting a river steamboat to accommodate their party," Hamilton said. "They needed about 100 rooms as well and they offered to lease us some of those rooms. So we looked at that as an option."

Tennessee could have gotten its usual hotel accommodations, but some people working on Hurricane Katrina relief would have been displaced.

"Obviously, we weren't going to do that," Hamilton said. "Once that became a moot point, we had to decide do we look at the riverboat option ESPN offered, or do we just go ahead and stick with our original contingency plan."

In order to provide some semblance of a routine, the Vols will stay at their normal home-game hotel on Friday night.

It's an hour-and-a-half flight from Knoxville to Baton Rouge, so the UT party will arrive around lunchtime Saturday.

Some rooms have been secured so players can relax and have a pre-game meal.

Cheerleaders will travel on the team plane and a separate regional jet has been chartered for "40 to 45" members of the Pride of the Southland Marching Band.

"The band was originally scheduled to go by bus to New Orleans and be there Thursday, Friday and Saturday," Hamilton said. "Obviously that went by the wayside."

Basically, the Vols are doing their best to adapt to an unusual, tragic set of circumstances in the aftermath of Katrina.

"Any inconvenience we've had to go through is minor compared to what the folks on the Gulf Coast have gone through," Hamilton said. "It's out of our normal routine, but we're fortunate to have an understanding coaching staff who manages its people. From the outset we've been working on contingency planning."

SEC commissioner Mike Slive has said the decision to hold the night game in Baton Rouge was totally up to LSU.

The Tigers wanted a night game. ESPN chose the game for its primetime Saturday timeslot. Case closed.

"In November, we've often asked Tennessee if they would be willing to play at night for television," Slive said. "Tennessee has often said, 'No, it's in November, it's late, we want to play in the afternoon.' We have always honored that request.

"We just didn't feel that it was appropriate for us to just overturn the ability of an institution to make its own decision about its home game time."

With plans finalized, it's time for Tennessee to forget about hotel rooms and concentrate on another tough SEC road trip after losing 16-7 to Florida.

"We're all partners in this league, ultimately," Hamilton said. "It's not the perfect situation. It's not how we would have drawn it up, but part of life's lesson is to learn how to react to adversity and become better because of it.

"Our kids and our coaches will respond to this and I think we'll be fine."

Like Hamilton, Slive said it's not a perfect situation, but it's a matter of adapting to circumstances.

"We will raise well over $2 million toward the relief fund that we want to go to the victims of the hurricane," he said. "It impacts schedules, fans and all of us. We wish it didn't, but it did.

"We've tried to address these issues in a way that tries to balance all of the equities, knowing that we cannot make it perfect for everyone."