The moment is here.
Coach Duggs makes his return to the National Title game in his second season with Tennessee.
Back to back appearances in the Natty?
Very impressive.
But without win, it wouldn’t mean much.
Duggs’ agent Rico Bo$co, his right-hand man Muj, his passing game coordinator Billy Football, and kicker/hold-back guy PFT Commenter were all on the sidelines for this momentous occasion.
A win would vault Duggs into rarified air with all the other legendary college football coaches of yesteryear.
A loss and Duggs would be left with more questions than answers about his coaching future.
#1 Tennessee against #2 Miami for all the marbles.
Duggs’ speech before the game consisted of a few, “I’m nervous, I’m nervous, I’m nervous” and something about mistakes, not letting up, protecting our team, cutting and slicing, the winning edge, carrying the fight, and Dwight Schrute.
We were off to a rollicking start.
Talking about the Coaching Carousel before kickoff was poor form on Duggs’ part.
The Vols won the coin toss and elected to kick.
First play of the game was a 34 yard reception for Miami tight end Justin Jones and star RB Lamont Alford followed it up with a 6 yard run and then a 20 yard run.
Miami star QB Travis Morris looked comfortable early.
Duggs’ defense held strong to their “bend-dont-break” ethos and forced a field goal from the Hurricanes.
3-0 Miami.
Duggs was confident saying, “You can’t beat me with field goals.”
3 straight runs from Rico Burgerton led to a quick first down for Tennessee.
His 4th run was for another 13 yards.
Duggs stuck to his run-early and run-often philosophy before hitting Grump Kirkpatrick for a 25 yard strike over the middle of the field off of play-action.
Miami had no answer for Rico early, every run was a chunk gain.
Rico punched in a 2 yard rushing score on 3rd down.
7-3 Duggs.
Duggs called it, “a picture-perfect opening drive.”
Morris hit Kenny Mccoy for a 20 yard gain before a 34 yard pass to Brian Pitts in the flat lead to a 1 yard TD from Alford.
10-7 Miami.
Way too easy for Miami on that drive.
Jazz Owens fumbled the kickoff but recovered it himself.
Crisis averted.
Stefan Cheah immediately got momentum back on the Vols’ side with a 13 yard run on a keeper followed by a 10 yard gain and 5 yard gain on back-to-back rushes for Rico.
1st quarter over.
First play of the 2nd quarter was an electric play from Cheah to find Rico for a 26 yard reception while Cheah was falling out of bounds.
After a screen pass to Rico and another run by Cheah the Vols found themselves with 1st and goal.
Owens walked in a 2 yard TD on 2nd down.
14-10 Tennessee.
Alford was beasting in the running game for the entire first half and Morris even flashed some running ability to pick up a couple of 1st downs.
A 9 yard screen pass to Jon Payne gave the Hurricanes another TD.
17-14 Miami.
Rico opened Tennessee’s following drive with a savage 11 yard run, an 8 yard reception, and a 5 yard run.
Rico was putting the team on his back.
Cheah continued to flourish in the read-option picking up rushing yards with ease because the Hurricanes were so worried about stopping Rico and Owens.
Cheah ran in an 11 yard score with 36 seconds left in the half.
21-17 Duggs.
Morris completed a couple passes in a row to Jones to bring the Hurricanes into field goal range.
The kicker split the uprights.
21-20 Tennessee.
Jazz Owens opened the 2nd half with a 51 yard return.
Rico continued his dream season, gashing the Hurricanes defense over and over again on the ground.
Cheah threw a 25 yard TD to Rico on the Shark Wheel play and Duggs went for 2 only for Cheah to throw the ball straight to a Hurricanes linebacker.
27-20 Tennessee.
The first play of Miami’s next drive was a huge gain from Kenny Mccoy on a wide receiver screen.
He then immediately fumbled on the next play after a catch, Vols recover.
After a review the call was reversed.
Huge break for Miami.
Jon Payne caught a 25 yard TD on 3rd and long for the Hurricanes.
27-27.
Cheah to Rico led to a huge conversion on 3rd down.
Duggs was screaming, “Calm, Cool, Collected.”
Rico missed a snap with a knee bruise, came back in, and on the next play broke the single-season rushing record for Tennessee.
Tied at 27 heading to the 4th.
Rico picked up a 27 yard gain on Tennessee’s patented Shark Wheel play and Cheah ran it in for a 13 yard TD on the next play.
Alford responded with a 23 yard run where he broke multiple tackles.
On 3rd down Morris threw a dart for a 22 yard gain followed by Victor Bailey rushing gain for Miami.
1st and goal.
Guess who? Alford punched it in on the goal-line.
34-34.
Owens came up huge as he has all season with a 49 yard kickoff return.
Rico had a strained shoulder forcing him out of the game!
4th and 4 for Miami at the edge of PFT’s field goal range.
2:52 left in the game.
Rico came back in the game and caught a 14 yard reception on 4th and 4!
Cheah went to take a shot downfield, got hit, and almost threw a pick!
Insanely intense.
Another Rico rush on 3rd down led to 1st and goal for the Vols.
Miami refused to call timeout for some reason and Rico ran the ball in with 16 seconds left.
41-34 Tennessee.
Tennessee picked off Morris on the following drive for Miami to seal a championship for Duggs and the Volunteers!!!!
Duggs gets his glory.
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