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Blue Cooper
Road trips are a big part of the college experience, as was demonstrated so well by Eric Stratton, rush chairman, and the gang in “Animal House.” When football teams hit the road, the experience may be less wild but no less memorable.
The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga team will climb aboard buses this morning for its final road game of the season, Saturday at The Citadel. It’s a long way to Charleston, S.C., but for some players, especially some of the seniors, it’s nothing but quality time together.
“You’ve got nothing better to do than entertain each other,” senior tight end Joseph Pitman said. “It’s all that kind of stupid stuff that’s just so funny. That’s what makes road trips so much fun.”
Senior defensive end Neil Brown said he sees the long bus rides as an opportunity to hang out with friends and mentor some of the younger players.
“I try and take time to appreciate being with the guys,” he said. “Me and (senior defensive tackle Rodney Beamon) usually always sit somewhere in the same vicinity and we always joke around. I always sit by different people; like the last few trips I’ve been talking to Louis Gibson, who’s one of the freshmen. I’ve been trying to talk to him and help him out because he’ll basically be following my footsteps playing defensive end. I’m trying to share some knowledge with him that may help him down the line.”
For any bus trip, especially the long ones — it’s nearly 450 miles to Charleston, according to Google Maps — having good movies to watch is a must, Brown said.
“You’ve got to make sure you get some good movies,” he said. “The movie selection at the beginning of the season wasn’t that great, and you’ve always got to have a good movie going. I’m going to make sure I bring some this time.”
On Brown’s playlist are “Semi-Pro,” “Vantage Point” and “Anchorman.”
Junior wide receiver Blue Cooper comes prepared when the Mocs (1-9, 0-6 SoCon) hit the road, bringing his laptop, his iPod and backup batteries for both, he said. Cooper said he couldn’t imagine road trips 20 years ago when your personal entertainment options were pretty limited.
“I guess you played rock-paper-scissors the whole time,” he joked.
For the Mocs, nothing would make this road trip better than beating the Bulldogs (3-6, 1-6) and stopping UTC’s eight-game losing streak. The road hasn’t been kind to the Mocs in the past four seasons, with just six wins in 22 games, and the atmosphere at The Citadel, where it’s homecoming weekend and the cadets are sure to be as loud as ever, won’t make the task any easier.
“It’s really a neat environment, and you admire the students that go there and what they do and what they stand for,” Mocs coach Rodney Allison said. “It really shows in how they play. They play hard, they play disciplined. I just think it’s a neat atmosphere and a neat place. It’s a hard place to win.”
This road trip will be the last with UTC for Allison, who will not be back as coach next season, and he said he can’t help but feel a little melancholy as the season winds down and his time comes to a close.
“There’s some of that, obviously, because I’ve been here for six years,” he said. “There’s the last bus trip, last this, last that. When you put your heart and soul into something for a long time and don’t get the results that you hoped to get from a win-loss standpoint when you first got here, there is some of that.”
John Frierson is in his fifth year at the Times Free Press and fifth year covering University of Tennessee at Chattanooga athletics. The bulk of his time is spent covering Mocs football, but he also writes about women’s basketball and the big-picture issues and news involving the athletic department. A native of Athens, Ga., John grew up a few hundred yards from the University of Georgia campus. Instead of becoming a Bulldog he attended Ole ...
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