Lisa Marchesoni
Posted: Saturday, December 26, 2009 3:08 pm

Tennessee Volunteers football fan Scott Daniel displays one of the family photos taken of he and his wife, Kathy, and children Claire, Shelley, Scott and Jim wearing all UT orange clothes.

Scott Daniel jokes if his blood is any color at all, “it’s orange.”

Daniel, 69, a retired Murfreesboro attorney, may be one of the most dedicated fans for the University of Tennessee Volunteers football team.

For 35 years between 1968-2003, Daniel attended every home game – and missed only five away games to watch sons Scottie and Jim play youth league football. He and his wife, Kathy, even named their first-born Claire “Volette” Daniel.

Although he won’t be at the Chick-fil-A Bowl Thursday in Atlanta when the Vols play Virginia Tech, Daniel will wear orange clothes and cheer when watching the game with his wife, brother Jim and wife Susan, and other family members.

“Tech has always had a great defense but we’ve got a good defense too,” Daniel analyzed.
He estimates the score “somewhere in the range of 27 to 24” with the Vols on top.
“In the last few games, the quarterback got his sea legs,” Daniel observed. “I think we’ll win. We’re on a roll.”

Daniel’s parents were Tennessee natives and UT fans that moved to Arlington, Va., where they reared Scott and his brother, Jim, another retired attorney and Rutherford County commissioner. Scot grew up loving both football and baseball. He remembers at age 8 compiling scrapbooks he still owns about the Vols.

He watched the Vols play in 1950. In 1951, the Vols won the national championship but lost in the Sugar Bowl.

“That was the worst day of my life,” Daniel said with disappointment clouding his face and voice. “I remember riding my bicycle to get the tension out.”

He played high school football in Arlington. When the Vols played Maryland at home, Daniel missed the game because he played a high school game but brother Jim watched the Vols. Scot dreamed of playing for the Vols.

After a stint in the Air Force, Daniel enrolled at East Tennessee State University where former coach Johnny Majors helped him and a friend get into the championship game. He considered being a coach or a sportswriter but enrolled in the UT Law School in 1964 where he kept cheering for the Vols.

Daniel chuckled when he realized he remembered more about games played 50 years ago than what he did the past few days.

One significant moment occurred when quarterback Condredge Holloway, one of the Vols’ most celebrated players and Daniel’s all-time favorite player, was injured during a game with UCLA. The Vols were losing when Holloway returned to the field.

The fans roared when they saw Holloway.

“He was just incredible,” Daniel said of Holloway leading the Vols to victory.

In another game, Holloway, nicknamed “the Artful Dodger,” scrambled in the backfield on the last play of the game against Clemson before tossing the ball to receiver Larry Seibers, who jumped up and caught it for a touchdown and a win.

“It was an incredible play,” Daniel recalled with excitement.

Another memorable game happened when the Vols, who were down 31 to 7 at halftime, rallied and beat Notre Dame. After the game, Daniel walked around Notre Dame wearing his orange cowboy hat and people asked to have their pictures taken with him.

The worst game occurred against Alabama coached by Bear Bryant when the rain poured until the last quarter. The Vols kicker attempted a field goal for the win. The field goal looked perfect but the officials ruled it was wide and UT lost.

Some other memories include:

• Watching a player for Mississippi State knock out two UT tailbacks in two consecutive plays in 1960 but the officials didn’t see either play.

• Witnessing players rioting on the field during one game with UT. One player was dragged 30 yards into the end zone.

• Viewing Joe Namath play for Alabama.

• Attending the Fiesta Bowl in 1998 when the Vols won the national championship.
• Spending his second honeymoon with Kathy in 1975 at a UT game in Hawaii.

“I bought an orange Hawaiian shirt I still wear,” Daniel said proudly.

He has an orange sweater over 25 years old and a button up sweater he bought in the early 70s.

Daniel brought UT football to his office.

Sandra Cullen, a fellow UT graduate and football fan, worked fulltime and parttime for Daniel for 32 years. She noted he worked the law practice around the games.
“His carpet in his office was orange,” Cullen recalled.

Daniel decorated with a bright orange leather couch and drapes.

The father passed his love of UT football to daughter Claire and her husband, Austin Maxwell, and their four children, who inherited his season tickets before investing in their own. He attends the games when one of the children can’t make it.

“Claire is amazing,” Daniel said of his oldest child. “She knows more football than any woman I know.”

When she met former coach Phil Fulmer at a UT Alumni Association dinner, she relayed how she was named Volette. Fulmer had never heard of anyone being named Volette after the team. Another coach used her middle name in recruiting talks.

Daniel pledges to follow the Vols for the rest of his life and intends to take his UT jersey to eternity.

“Put it in my casket with me,” the die-hard fan said.

Lisa Marchesoni may be reached at 869-0814 or at lmarchesoni@murfreesboropost.com.