Mattingly: Catching up with record-breaker Mills

Johnny Mills set the single-game receiving record with 225 yards against Kentucky in 1967 .

Sometimes record-setting performances happen in unexpected places, at unexpected times.

It was a television game in the days when there were precious few games on the tube.

In the ninth game of the 1966 season, Nov. 19, Tennessee, unranked in Associated Press top 10, and Kentucky squared off at Neyland Stadium, with the game being regionally televised on ABC. That was the good news.

The bad news, history tells us, was that the other televised game that gray November Saturday, the one fans in the Knoxville area couldn't see, was Notre Dame versus Michigan State, the famed "Tie One for the Gipper" game in East Lansing, Mich.

Notre Dame gratefully accepted a 10-10 tie against the Spartans, on their way to winning a national championship despite Alabama sitting there at season's end at 10-0 and 11-0 after a win over Nebraska in the Sugar Bowl.

In Knoxville, there was considerable history made on Shields-Watkins Field. Tennessee fans watched in amazement as the Vols continued the development of a passing attack that amassed yardage in unprecedented big chunks.

Johnny Mills, a wide receiver from Elizabethton wearing No. 85, caught seven balls for 225 yards that day, all from quarterback Dewey "Swamp Rat" Warren, to set a pass receiving yardage record that stood nearly 35 years, before being broken in the 2001 LSU game, the night Kelley Washington caught 11 for 256 yards.

Mills had receptions of 33 and 41 yards in the first quarter, 12 and 33 yards in the second, a 13 yarder in the third, and a 72- and 21 yarder in the fourth. The 72-yard play was for a touchdown. The Vols eventually prevailed 28-19.

"Johnny was another of those route-runner, good-catcher-type guys who did not have great speed, but had the ability to maneuver himself into the openings," his head coach, Doug Dickey, said. "He knew how to fake and move, set up the defender, then end up somewhere catching the ball."

Mills and Warren were part of an amazing sophomore class that had to have caught Dickey's eye in his maiden season in 1964, including Austin Denney, Paul Naumoff, Mack Gentry, Joe Graham, Bobby Morel, Tom Fisher, Art Galiffa, Harold Stancell, Ron Widby, Doug Archibald, and Jerry Smith, all starters sometime during their careers.

"Johnny was a competitor," Warren said this week. "He didn't think anybody could cover him one-on-one. He had great hand-eye coordination. He had moves that could fake me out. He always said, 'I can get open.' "

Mills led the 1966 team with 48 catches for 725 yards, both record numbers at that time. Mills more than doubled what All-America Buddy Cruze did in 1956, in terms of receptions and yardage.

Mills' performance did serious damage to the record books. No UT player had caught more than 23 passes up to that time. Moreover, the player who did catch 23 balls also was named Johnny Mills, based on his performance in 1965.

A number of big-name Vols have taken their best shot at Mills over the years.

Willie Gault came closest with 217 yards against Vanderbilt in 1981. Then came Carl Pickens with 201 against Kentucky in 1990, Stanley Morgan with 201 against TCU in 1976, Peerless Price with 199 against Florida State in the 1999 Fiesta Bowl, and Anthony Hancock had 196 in the 1981 Garden State Bowl. It's an impressive group, but none of them could match what Mills did. Mills' effort literally stood the test of time over the generations.

Mills keeps it all in perspective.

"I remember thinking after the game that I had a great senior season made all the better because I had broken my arm in the 1965 UCLA game," Mills said this week. "It was not for sure I was even going to get to play in 1966. I remember finishing the game and looking up in the stands, knowing it was the last time I would ever play in Neyland Stadium. It was a bittersweet moment."

Mills had a spectacular two-game run in 1965 and 1966, in which he caught 10 passes against UCLA and came back in the season opener against Auburn to catch 11. He was All-SEC in 1966, one of four Vols named.

He held the receiving record for 35 years. Few records have lasted as along as Mills' did.

Mills says he's getting stronger after a recent heart attack. His wife has promoted him to "greeter" at Mills Greenhouse. His grandchildren keep him busy.

Life he says is good.

"Everybody had a time. I had my time," Mills said. "They probably look at those old videos and say, 'Boy, the guy sure is slow. He sure does run archaic routes.' But as they mature, they'll probably think he wasn't bad for his time."

Mills wasn't bad for his time, or anybody else's.

Tom Mattingly is the author of "The Tennessee Football Vault: The Story of the Tennessee Volunteers, 1891-2006" (2006), now available in second edition at fine bookstores, and "Tennessee Football: The Peyton Manning Years" (1998). He was actually in attendance at the 1966 Kentucky game. Comments may be sent to tjmshm@comcast.net. His News Sentinel blog is called "The Vol Historian."

© 2009, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.
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