Upset blocked

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. -- Daniel Lincoln was having a bad day.

Lincoln was a kicker with a sore kicking leg. A kicker who already had missed two field goals, one short and one blocked. A kicker on the road in a hostile venue against the No. 1 team in the nation.

But the former Freshman All-American remained confident, and so did his coach -- on the surface, at least.

Lane Kiffin didn't say anything to Lincoln moments before Tennessee's junior kicker jogged onto the field with four seconds left in archrival Alabama's stadium.

"He just smiled at me, and I smiled right back," Lincoln said. "He knew we had it. I knew I had it."

Lincoln might have had it, but it didn't matter.

UT's line caved for the second time in mere minutes against big Crimson Tide noseguard Terrence Cody -- whose size, strength and drive was the difference in Alabama's 12-10 win.

The 6-foot-5, 354-pound Cody bowled over 270-pound UT guard (and former walk-on) Cory Sullins twice in the final 11 minutes to block attempts from 43 and 44 yards.

Neither might have mattered had Lincoln connected from 47 yards to end the first half. But a nagging quadriceps injury flared up in pregame warmups and left him a tad lame, and his 47-yarder fell short of the crossbar.

"We allowed so much push up front," Kiffin said of the final kick. "They put their big boys in there. There's big Cody versus a Sullins. We tried to avoid that matchup as much as we could offensively, but you can't avoid it on field-goal block."

And Lincoln couldn't hit the kick as high as he wanted, because he and Kiffin admitted that wouldn't have been enough in Saturday's circumstances.

Lincoln felt a tweak while warming up just before the game, and he told Kiffin that his absolute max would be 48 yards.

"There was so much penetration, that I don't know if was a height issue," Kiffin said. "But he doesn't have the big leg right now. He can't kick the ball up high. If he kicked the ball up high, it would never get there, so we can't allow the penetration up front."

The blocked kicks spoiled what would have be a classic, comeback victory and the monumental moment of Kiffin's first season. Major college football's youngest head coach didn't deny of that.

"This is going to be a really special team someday," Kiffin said. "It's going to be a championship team. It's just a matter of time before we get there. But you can see it coming.

"If we make the kick at the end of the game, it's a completely different feeling in here, and a completely different feeling in this locker room, and we're talking about one of our greatest games in years. The comeback, the finish, people saying, 'Your team was unbelievable.' I have to keep that in mind, and that's why I keep these guys positive."

UT looked all but finished with 6:31 left. Senior Leigh Tiffin's fourth field goal of the day (in four tries) skimmed over the crossbar, giving Alabama a 12-3 lead.

The Vols punted less than one minute later, but the defense hung tough -- as it has done all season. But reserve linebacker Chris Donald was flagged for roughing the punter with less than 4:00 on the clock, giving the Tide the ball and a fresh set of downs.

Vols All-America safety Eric Berry forced and recovered a fumble on the next play, though, and UT senior quarterback Jonathan Crompton passed to junior receiver Gerald Jones for an 11-yard touchdown that cut the score to 12-10 with 1:19 left.

Junior receiver Denarius Moore pounced on the ensuing onside kick, and Crompton connected with junior tight end Luke Stocker for a tough 23-yard catch to put UT at the Alabama 27-yard line -- just inside Lincoln's adjusted range.

"After I made that catch, I knew that we were in field-goal range," Stocker said. "Words can't describe the way I felt, just thinking, 'We're going to win this game.'

"There wasn't a doubt in my mind we were going to win it."

The Vols didn't keep hurrying from that point, opting to run one more play -- a 1-yarder from senior tailback Montario Hardesty -- before spike-stopping the clock.

"I'll go back over that a million times," Kiffin said of his last-minute clock management. "I'm already killing myself for it, but you'd like to think you could make a field goal to win the game. You go there, and you turn the ball over, and all of a sudden you're killing yourself for that. You get in field-goal range. We knew where we had to get to. We got 5 yards past where we felt we were in field-goal range. You (don't want to) risk turning the ball over there, or you risk a penalty. I didn't want to do that to our guys. I didn't want to take it out our hands that way.

"I wanted us to line up and kick a field goal to beat the No. 1 team in the country."

That was the plan, anyway.

"It was so high, and then so low there at the end," UT junior defensive end Chris Walker said. "We were ready to be celebrating with our team.

"It's just hard to take this. We came down here and played so well, and we should have beaten the No. 1 team in the country."

The Vols out-gained the Tide, and they undoubtedly controlled matters for most of the second half.

"We had some momentum going," Kiffin said. "Guys were making plays, but we didn't score when we got down there. You go play the No. 1 team in the country, you need to get a touchdown when you go down there. And you sure can't get your field goals blocked and missed.

"You've got to make field goals. They made their field goals, and they won the game."