Untimely fumble opened the floodgates for Gators

GAINESVILLE, Fla. - As Florida players celebrated and the Gators' band played, Arian Foster stood near the spot where a third-quarter handoff slipped through his hands.

Hours later, the Tennessee tailback still was searching for answers after the Vols' worst loss in Phillip Fulmer's 16 seasons as a head coach and trying to come to grips with the play that sparked 31 unanswered Florida points.

"We lost," Foster said. "It's hard to swallow sometimes. Especially all the work and preparation you put into the season, the game, everything, your teammates you sweat with, cry with. Sometimes you're just stunned.

"You want to take things in and gather yourself."

That search for what went wrong in the 22nd-ranked Vols' 59-20 loss to No. 5 Florida on Saturday in The Swamp will no doubt go on for some time.

It's not exactly a new problem, either.

A year ago, the Vols rushed for minus-11 yards against the Gators in a 21-20 loss in Knoxville.

Saturday, their run game produced just 37 yards - and the momentum-sucking botched handoff for which both Foster and quarterback Erik Ainge claim responsibility.

The specifics of what happened aren't in doubt.

Ainge, who has played the Vols' first three games with a broken pinkie finger on his right hand, moved to his left and tried to hand the ball off to Foster with his left hand.

Somewhere between Ainge's left hand and Foster's arms, the ball came free, eventually bouncing off Foster's finger tips some 5 yards downfield.

"I just felt like I never got control of it," Foster said.

Said Ainge: "Whether it was his arm that came down early or me not getting the ball in there, I'm not sure. We've got to watch the film, but it's on me."

Whoever ultimately deserves the most responsibility for the play, it's the only way Tennessee is able to manage handoffs since Ainge broke his finger the Monday before UT's season opener at Cal.

"We've worked a lot at it, so we have no excuses," offensive coordinator David Cutcliffe said. "It's got to happen. That's the only way he can do it right now. (Ainge) can't put his other hand in there. We knew that going in. We just didn't execute. That's twice it's happened.

"This one was a critical play. I was being very conservative, in my mind, at the time down eight (points), just trying to get some field position. Every now and then those things blow up in your face."

No one pointed fingers at Foster, Ainge or anyone else following Saturday's loss. They hardly needed to. There was plenty of blame to go around.

An anemic run game averaged 1.8 yards per carry, led by Foster with 26 yards on 11 carries.

Ainge cost the Vols at least three points with an interception on third down at the Gators' 9-yard line.

Tennessee's offense inside the Florida 20 shut down, producing just 13 points in four first-half trips.

But despite all its struggles, Tennessee had the ball with a chance to tie the game midway through the third quarter until the football - like UT's chances to win the ballgame - went out of control and into the hands of linebacker Dustin Doe, who took it 18 yards for a touchdown.

"We got the game to 28-20, we were rallying. Then we fumble the football," said tight end Chris Brown, who scored Tennessee's lone offensive touchdown on a 15-yard pass just before halftime. "Who knows what the game could have been. We just have to go back to the drawing board."

Oddly enough, Tennessee felt good when it looked at the drawing board earlier this week.

Cutcliffe thought the Vols could run the ball, certainly better than they did.

So did UT center Josh McNeil, which is why the 39-point loss is so hard to swallow.

"This loss is tough," McNeil said. "I thought we had a great week of practice, and we were really geared up for this game. And it just didn't turn out the way we wanted it to."

Part of that had to do with a twisting and turning Gators defensive front, and a willingness to bring players off the edge to stop the run.

Some of it was busted plays that have plagued the Vols at times during their first three games.

And a large part of it was the botched handoff that swung momentum.

"It hurts," Ainge said. "The score of the game could be a lot different if those (red-zone possessions) are touchdowns. There's a lot of things that happened. They played great, and we gave them a lot, too."

© 2007, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.
Want to use this article? Click here for options!