Charles Bowers has been a University of Tennessee men's basketball fan for 56 years. Back in the 1950s he sold popcorn at Alumni Gym just to be able to watch the games.

Early Wednesday morning he went to great lengths once again to see the Vols play. For more than an hour, he waited in frigid weather for the ticket office at Thompson-Boling Arena to open at 8:30 a.m. so he could buy tickets to the UT-Kentucky game.

"They're in a zone," Bowers said. "They can't run out of fuel."

Bowers said he hasn't seen enthusiasm like this for men's basketball since Ray Mears was coach in the 1960s and 70s. For the home game against Florida on Jan. 21, Tennessee saw its first sold-out crowd since 2001.

"They're excited," Bowers said, while standing among about 50 other fans who showed up for the last-minute ticket sale. "Orange juice is flowing."

Tiffany Carpenter, Athletic Department spokeswoman, said a few tickets remained Wednesday for the March 1 game. But she expects they will be gone by early today.

Carpenter said she's happy to see the renewed enthusiasm. UT has increased the number of student seats available by almost 2,000 and will be pulling back the curtains to make room for more fans.

"It's usually the Kentucky fans buying us out of tickets," she said. "Not this year."

But a few Kentucky fans got good seats among the Tennessee crowd.

Nicole Crockett, a doctoral student in English at UT, arrived at the arena a little before 8 a.m. to get her tickets.

She was born and raised in Lexington, Ky., by a former UK basketball player. Her father, Rick Drewitz, played under Adolph Rupp in the early 1970s and raised his family as Wildcats fans.

"I bleed blue," Crockett said.

She acknowledged her family will be squeezed between some very excited Tennessee fans, especially after UT beat Kentucky at Rupp Arena earlier this month.

Though students do not need to buy tickets to the games — they can swipe their student ID at the door — some students weren't going to wait and see if they might be one of the 6,000 students who get through the gates.

James Fredricks, a sophomore, bought three tickets Wednesday to be sure he and his friends will get into the game and have good seats.

"I don't want to be camping out in the cold the night before just to see if I might get in," he said. "There's no 'maybe' this way."

Rachel Kovac may be reached at 865-342-6306.