Mattingly: Career highlight lasted a long 18 seconds

It didn’t make my list of the top 10 defensive gems in Tennessee football history a couple of weeks ago, but, in retrospect, it should have.

The scene was the Meadowlands in East Rutherford, N.J., on Aug. 30, 1987, when the Vols squared off against Iowa in the Kickoff Classic. Tennessee won 23-22 on a field goal by walkon placekicker Phil Reich. He wasn’t a walkon long, being awarded a scholarship after the game.

It was the starting point for a 10-2-1 season, first with 10 wins since 1972, capped by a 27-22 win over Indiana in the Peach Bowl at the old Atlanta Stadium. It was the first of a number of down-to-the-wire finishes for the Vols that season.

The game’s biggest play came in the second quarter, with the Vols leading 7-3. Iowa had the ball, after a Vol fumble, fourth-and-goal at the Vols’ 1. Time for a big play? You bet.

Hawkeye quarterback Chuck Hartleib rolled to his right, and, as defensive tackle and Rhea County native David Johnson, all 6-foot-3, 240 pounds of him, hit him, he pitched the ball in the general direction of fullback Dave Hudson.

Darrin Miller, wearing No. 45 on an orange and white jersey and playing outside linebacker, grabbed the errant toss and headed for the northeast corner, far away from Jimmy Hoffa’s alleged resting place.

The Knoxville Journal’s Randy Moore said: “Miller stepped up, intercepted the pitch, and set sail on one of the longest runs not only in terms of distance, but also time consumed in Vol history.”

The run covered 96 yards and gave the Vols a 14-3 lead.

“When they optioned my way,” Miller said, “the inside linebackers are supposed to take the quarterback, and I’m supposed to go directly to the pitch. I wasn’t thinking about anything. I was just running.”

Tennessee defensive backs Terry McDaniel and Victor Peppers, despite being spotted 10 yards or so on Miller’s dash, quickly caught up and led the way for Miller’s foray goalward. ABC broadcaster Keith Jackson, watching Miller’s run, talked about the “aches and pains” hitting him about the Iowa 30, but Miller had what it took to get there. Barely.

“It was the highlight of my career,” Miller said after the game. “For me to score on a 96-yard touchdown is unbelievable. I was lucky I caught it, but when I did, I just took off. I knew if I got past the 50, I had a chance. I was glad to see Terry McDaniel.”

“Something like what happened to Darrin is a dream come true,” said linebacker Keith DeLong, whose progress in the middle allowed Miller’s move to the outside. “I thought Darrin handled the switch very well. He’ll do anything for the good of the cause.”

Miller’s big play caught the attention of head coach John Majors, who had to have been impressed watching a player wearing his collegiate jersey number make such a big play at such an opportune moment.

“It was an outstanding play and one of the most surprising I’ve ever seen,” Majors said.

Iowa coach Hayden Fry, who saw his team recover nicely from this unlikely turn of events to lead 19-14 after three quarters and 22-20 until the final frantic seconds, had this comment: “When they caught the ball in mid-air, there went the game.”

In the Tennessee record books, only John Caldwell, who returned a fumble in the air 107 yards (on a 110-yard field), has run farther with an errant football. Miller is at the top of the list on the more conventional 100-yard field.

You might also remember that Carl Johnson and Conrad Graham did likewise in 1971 — Johnson 87 yards against Kentucky and Graham 76 against Penn State. Julian Battle covered 81 yards with a bobble in the 2001 Notre Dame game.

The News Sentinel’s Mike Strange had this note of perspective. “The elapsed time on the run was 18 seconds,” Strange wrote. “Carl Lewis slept like a baby that night.”

The game will be remembered for a number of happenings. It was a memorable debut for freshman tailback Reggie Cobb, who carried 25 times for 138 yards, and for Reich who booted three field goals in four tries, including the game-winner.

The Journal’s Ben Byrd perceptively chronicled the game and the Vols who made it happen.

“In football, new heroes always step forward to replace the old,” Byrd wrote, “and now, such names as Cobb, Reich, Miller, Ziegler, and Francis seem destined to take their place alongside the men who have given Tennessee its illustrious past.”

For Miller, the road to wearing the hero’s laurels was a long one, 96 yards, in less than record time, but he knew well the task ahead of him.

“I thought I’d get there eventually.”

Tom Mattingly is the author of “The Tennessee Football Vault: The Story of the Tennessee Volunteers, 1891-2006” (2006), to be published in second edition in 2009, and “Tennessee Football: The Peyton Manning Years” (1998). He may be reached at tjmshm@comcast.net. His News Sentinel blog is called “The Vol Historian.”