Mocs aim just to ‘go 1-0’ again
MARTIN, Tenn. — Khayyan Edwards said early this week that by the time the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga football team had returned to campus in the early hours of last Sunday morning, the team’s dramatic 29-28 win at The Citadel was erased from the Mocs’ collective mind.
“We got the bus ride home to enjoy (the win),” the junior defender said. “We watched a little game film, but then it was, ‘Let’s stop talking about The Citadel. Let’s focus on Martin.’”
The Mocs enter today’s game at Hardy Graham Stadium at UT-Martin with the opportunity to improve to 3-0 for the second time in three seasons. UTC has not defeated the Skyhawks since 1993, but the teams have met only twice since then before today.
But for the Mocs, it’s not about going 3-0, or defeating a UTM team for the first time since the elder George Bush’s first year of presidency. It’s about going 1-0 for the week for
the fourth consecutive game and fifth time in the last six.
And for second-year coach Tom Arth, it’s more about getting better each day and letting the weeks take care of themselves on game day.
“From my standpoint, it’s our ability to go out and play as well as we can play and put
our team in position to be successful,” Arth said. “The mentality we all have is every week is a new week, and what we’ve done in the past — what happened last season, last week, the week before that — has no bearing on what’s going to
happen on Saturday.
“We’ve got to show up every single day with the right mentality, the right attitude, and compete in practice. If we continue to do that, we will continue to improve and get better. That’s the goal for me right now.”
The Mocs have not played well in their last two games against the Skyhawks and former UTC offensive coordinator Jason Simpson. In the 2013 season opener, the Skyhawks came to Chattanooga and beat the 24th-ranked Mocs 31-21, a game that eventually kept the Mocs out of the Football Championship Subdivision playoffs, since they finished 8-4 that season and won a share of the Southern Conference championship. Last season UTM defeated 15th-ranked UTC 21-7 in the Mocs’ worst offensive performance of the year.
They can shake those demons with a win today — in other words, “go 1-0.”
Quarterback Nick Tiano has been the loudest supporter of the mentality, telling media every week his goal that following Saturday is “to go 1-0.”
“We’re all locked in on just this week,” he said. “Last week that game was up and down, and we found a way to win. That’s what good teams do: They find a way to win on good days and bad days. That’s my biggest message to myself and these guys: Let’s just keep finding ways to win each week.”
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress. com. Follow him on Twitter @genehenley3.