Florida Fails to Shame Lame Lane

GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- It pains me to say that Lane Kiffin, the rockhead of Rocky Top, won the grudge match. He and Tennessee may have lost the football game, 23-13, but by limiting Florida's freakishly potent offense to 323 yards and forcing two rare turnovers from The Perfect Human Being (Tim Tebow), Kiffin didn't suffer nearly as much as he should have after the punkish cheap shots and low-class accusations he directed at Urban Meyer and the country's pre-eminent college program.

He was supposed to be road kill Saturday, a coaching pinata. Instead, he was wielding the stick again, irritating and even scaring Florida folks who were left to half-heartedly sing at the end, "Rocky Top, you'll always be, second in the SEC.'' No, this was not the party music that anyone had in mind, and when it was over, Kiffin left town with his limbs intact and a content look on his boyish, Dennis the Menace face. He even received a brief post-game handshake at midfield from Meyer, which was more a reflection of his rival's professionalism and dignity than any respect he might have gained for Kiffin.

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Leave it to Lame Lane in the press conference to say his grand plan of torching All Things Gators couldn't have worked better, as if it qualifies as gravitas to accuse Meyer of cheating and predict he'd sing "Rocky Top'' after beating Florida. "It worked perfectly,'' Kiffin said. "It took all the pressure off the players. We played the No. 1 team in the nation with no pressure on them. It was all on me. We were 30-point underdogs in this place and it really helped them go out and play ball.''

Gee, what's next? A Lane Kiffin self-help book? An Oprah appearance? At least he wasn't calling this a moral victory or threatening to sing "Rocky Top,'' saying, "No, we lost a game. Maybe I'll come back here for basketball and sing it for [coach] Bruce Pearl.''

The guy is so smug, I'd love to shake him by his nose hairs. "I would think in [the Florida] locker room, there are some frustrated guys,'' Kiffin chirped. "Because they had high expectations about what they were supposed to do."

The fans had come seeking blood, of course, trying to transform The Swamp into a raucous pit. They stood, booed, screamed expletives and furiously flapped their arms for the Gator Chomp when Kiffin led his team on the field. They hung banners out on University Avenue -- "DIE LAME KIFFIN!'' read one -- and debated all week whether the final score would be 100-0, 82-3, 70-6 or merely 50-7. Remember Meyer's vindictive mood last year against Georgia, when he called two timeouts in the final minute of a 49-10 stomping as payback after the Bulldogs had foolishly danced en masse in the end zone during a win? Remember what happened when LSU and Oklahoma hurled insults last year, Florida State the year before? This should have been the ugliest retribution of all.

Until it became very apparent early that Kiffin's father, Monte, was going to save his son's hide. Hired as the defensive coordinator after a successful run with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the elder Kiffin brings a touch of class to his son's clown show and defensive expertise that, for a half anyway, slowed down an offense that had averaged 643.5 yards and 59 points in its opening two games. Part of the problem was Florida's maddeningly conservative game plan, which allowed Tebow to throw downfield only on a few occasions in an offense that clearly missed game-breaker Percy Harvin, now Brett Favre's pet weapon in the NFL. Even when Old Man KIffin consistently stacked eight defenders in the box, the Gators didn't trust their passing game, leaving Tebow without a touchdown pass for the first time in his last 31 games. Tennessee's defense was solid, led by safety Eric Berry, who showcased his legitimate Heisman Trophy candidacy by blitzing Tebow, breaking down receivers and creating havoc. While there never was any real sense that Florida would lose, there also was no feeling that the scoreboard would need a third digit under GATORS.

The crowd actually went silent when Tebow, poised to score a fourth-quarter touchdown that would have padded the lead to 30-7, fumbled at the Tennessee 4. Seven plays later, the Vols scored on a touchdown run by bullish workhorse Montario Hardesty, who rushed for 96 yards against a defense that Kiffin had effusively praised, saying, "I look at their 11 starters, and I think you have 11 NFL players. I would think they're maybe the most talented defense to ever play. We're going to have our hands full." Turns out Florida was equally as challenged.

"It wasn't how we envisioned or hoped,'' said Tebow, who didn't have speed receiver Deonte Thompson (hamstring injury) and dealt with a star running back, Jeff Demps, who played with a 101-degree fever. "But it's a win and it's good enough for all of us.''

"Obviously, I think we could have played better. I think there's so much pressure on this team to perform perfectly, which is good,'' Meyer said. "I'd rather be on that end than on, 'Boy, great job. We lost by 10.' I don't want to do that. There's a lot of pressure on these guys and I felt it in there [the locker room].''

How much did he feel it? Meyer was compelled to "lighten the mood'' of a team that was hanging its collective head. Imagine winning a game against a heated rival and feeling like you've lost. Such is the burden of playing and coaching at Florida.

Not that Meyer had any chance to run up the score at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium, an erector-set bowl that stands as one of college football's grand cathedrals. But disappointed as Gator Nation is today, he's better off having not done so. When you're bidding for a third national championship in four years, why participate in over-the-top payback stunts? Even if the fans were jacked for an all-time blowout, being the best means staying above the riffraff. Class trumps crass every time, however tempting it was to punish a 34-year-old smart ass who has acted like the biggest jerk in college sports. Before the game, Florida offensive linemen Carl Johnson and Maurkice Pouncey were taunting the Tennessee players, motioning to their bench with "come here'' gestured. A Florida assistant corralled both and lectured them, as did one of the game officials.

It's one thing to motivate a sluggish program with fire and pride. But never has anyone entered a high-profile coaching job with such low-road tactics. At his introductory press conference, Kiffin brashly proclaimed that he would beat Florida in his first season and sing "Rocky Top'' all night. If that was just silly, he was dirty and wrong when he accused Meyer of cheating by calling recruit Nu'Keese Richardson while he was visiting Tennessee. "I love the fact that Urban had to cheat and still didn't get him,'' Kiffin said after signing Richardson. Meyer, of course, had done nothing wrong, while Kiffin proceeded to commit several minor NCAA violations over the coming months, including the idea of using a fog machine to impress recruits at Neyland Stadium. He also tweaked another elite Southeastern Conference coach, Nick Saban, after Kiffin hired away chief recruiters from his Alabama program.

All of which has turned Kiffin into an anti-Christ figure in a part of the country that treats college football like religion. He claims the potshots were all shtick, but he is in a profession where disrespect is no laughing matter. "Some of the stuff I had to do," he said. "I didn't like it. I had to be aggressive. I had to attack.''

Which makes him a marked man everywhere he goes, particularly in Gainesville. "I don't like anyone talking about coach Meyer," Tebow said."I try to not let it affect me, although I always have coach Meyer's back in anything because I know what type of person he is and I know what he believes in, I know what he stands for. But I don't think coach Meyer worried about it too much. I think we kind of dropped it or moved past it."

"Water under the bridge a long time ago,'' Meyer insisted.

Others weren't so forgetful. "That's something you don't forget," Gators guard James Wilson said. "I don't know what he was thinking when he said all that It kind of hit a nerve.''


"A bozo,'' offensive tackle Matt Patchan called Kiffin.

Even Kiffin's predecessor, Phil Fulmer, weighed in with a warning. "We were very pleased with what we were able to accomplish during the majority of our time at Tennessee, and we did it without having to be brash and so on,'' said Fulmer, who was forced out last season. "But this is his style, what he thought he had to do. We didn't have a very good season last year. I certainly take full responsibility for that. And now it's his turn to do it as he thinks he needs to do it. But the problem in this league is you're going to play great football teams every week once you get into the Southeastern Conference schedule. So, if you're going to be brash, you'd better be able to back it up."

But while it's still a loss, dropping Tennessee to 1-2, it's hard to argue with Kiffin's contention that his players were looser because of his wild salvos. "I really don't look at it as him putting a bull's-eye on us," said Berry, an NFL superstar in the works. "It probably doesn't make sense to a lot of people, but in my eyes, it looks like he just wanted to tell us that he had our back and whoever we played or whatever we had to face, he was going to ride with us until the end."

One reason Meyer wasn't as vindictive as he was against, say, Georgia was the presence of Monte Kiffin. For years, dating back to his years as a Notre Dame assistant, Meyer would visit Kiffin in Tampa and study his defensive philosophies. Much of what Florida does on defense has been spun from Kiffin's strategies. "I would go down and spend time with coach Kiffin and he was very hospitable and obviously one of the great coaches in NFL history,'' Meyer said. "And actually he came up here [to Gainesville] I believe it was a year and a half ago, it was after our tough year we had on defense. He was good enough to spend basically an entire day with us in the meeting rooms and talking football with us.' He's a good person and a great coach.''

So it surprised Meyer than Kiffin's son would make false accusations. "Actually, yes it did,'' he said. "That's one of the only comments I'll make on it, because I'm close to his father and I just know the way he is. But that's all over with. Monte Kiffin and myself have a great relationship.''

As tactically brilliant as the elder Kiffin can be, he still had no answers for Tebow in the third quarter. He is a show within a show as a runner, and try as the Vols did, they couldn't tackle. "I don't think he's human,'' Lane Kiffin said. "There were times when I asked [assistant coaches] on the headset, 'Is he ever going to wear down?' But he never does. Our defense worked hard and you just prayed to get it to third-and-4, because if it was third-and-3, he was going to put his head down and run over people.''

Said Tennessee linebacker Rico McCoy: "You've got everybody telling you, 'Knock him out. Knock Tebow out. C'mon and knock him out.' But it's like hitting a fullback. He's 245, 250 pounds. He's a load. I'm not going to lie to you, he's a big boy. He's tough."

With USC's loss, Florida and Texas are the clear-cut heavyweights in the sport. They could wind up playing for the national title -- in a Hollywood setting at the Rose Bowl -- if Texas beats Oklahoma and mows through the Big 12 while the Gators handle a fairly negotiable schedule. Meanwhile, Lame Lane Kiffin will continue to flap his gums so much, we'll be referring to his town as Knocksville.

Unfortunately, all Saturday did was feed the monster.