Content was originally hosted at americanrugbynews.com
Posted: October 16, 2005
Tennessee best at ASU Invitational
By Brian Lowe
If there were any doubts as to the legitimacy of Tennessee they should have been at least part way dispelled following the Volunteers’ clean sweep at the ASU Invitational hosted by Arkansas State in Jonesboro, AR.
Tennessee knocked off Oklahoma and Truman State to remain undefeated this fall. It was the first time that Tennessee and Oklahoma had played each other.
In their opening game, the #7 ranked Vols dispatched #15 Oklahoma by 31-13, and then followed that with a 50-8 decision over Truman State. To be fair to the Sooners though, Tennessee benefited from a couple of late intercept tries as OU was desperately trying to force the issue as time was winding down.
Tennessee center Kevin Hartley played well and scored in both games, while scrumhalf Brett Jones also dotted down and had his kicking boots on throughout the round-robin tourney. Prop Josh Peay stood out, as did new blindside flanker Will James. Wing Luke Woods, who has been getting his name on the score sheet most weeks, again had some fine moments and finished off several try-scoring movements.
“OU is a very hard working group of guys with a lot of talent,” said Tennessee head coach Butch Robertson. “OU’s tough and they know what they’re doing. The game itself turned out to be a case of both teams being excited about playing each other, so it wasn’t until the last 20 minutes that things started to fall into place for us.
“It would not have surprised me at all to have come out on the losing end in one or both of those games.”
The results saw Tennessee move to 6-0 on the season.