Vols baseball coach Tony Vitello sends warning to fans ahead of Tennessee football's matchup against Arkansas
Tennessee Vols baseball coach Tony Vitello knows as well as anyone that the competition in conference games in the SEC can provide for some intense moments. That's why Vitello sent a warning this week to fans ahead of Tennessee's showdown in Fayetteville with the Arkansas Razorbacks. "It's going to be tough is the bottom line," […]
Tennessee Vols baseball coach Tony Vitello knows as well as anyone that the competition in conference games in the SEC can provide for some intense moments.
That's why Vitello sent a warning this week to fans ahead of Tennessee's showdown in Fayetteville with the Arkansas Razorbacks.
"It's going to be tough is the bottom line," said Vitello during an appearance this week on WNML's SportsTalk. "I think it's going to be tougher than people expect. I mean, on the road in the SEC is incredibly tough. But really just any SEC game. You saw it with Kentucky and Mississippi. The Georgia/Alabama game is what it was supposed to be. But you didn't get to that final score the conventional way or the way that you would think. So with it being league play, I don't it's as chaotic as baseball, but it's pretty dang close. Expect chaos and expect things to be more difficult than maybe the pundits want to make it.
"I think the one thing that Arkansas football coaches are telling their guys this week, if I could predict, you know I don't know if it's accurate, is 'hey, these guys haven't played anybody, the competition level is not what we can bring to the table, they certainly deserve to be ranked high, they deserve to undefeated, but they have not been challenged the way that we're about to challenge them'. I think Tennessee can play off of that as well. They're looking to prove themselves each week. And they know they have not played their best ball, they have not seen their best competition. So it's kind of nice to be on that incline and have that natural hunger that's probably built into our locker room."
Vitello, unsurprisingly, is spot on (hey, he's a national championship-winning coach…he knows what competing at the highest level in college sports is all about).
Road games in the SEC can be wild and provide unexpected moments. Games that are blowouts on paper are often closer than expected thanks to some of the tough road environments in the conference (that's been very true already this season, just look at Georgia, who narrowly defeated Kentucky in Lexington before losing to Alabama in Tuscaloosa).
Tennessee isn't taking Arkansas lightly. This Vols team has already shown that they know how to compete at an elite level on a weekly basis.
But Arkansas will have the same approach in a national prime time game. This is one of those matchups where every player on the field will have a little extra juice.
Tennessee will need to bring their A game to Fayetteville. The last thing they want to do is provide any sort of opening for the Razorbacks to pull off the upset.
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