By Steve Williams
A friend of mine, Tom Heck, gave me the following story to tell on “Bama Week” and “the Third Saturday in October”.
It’s about his Uncle Len Coffman, who played for the Tennessee Volunteers in the late 1930s.
Had it not been for the University of Kentucky, we may have never known about Tom’s uncle and one of the Vols’ meanest and toughest players there ever was.
The story goes like this:
Uncle Len began playing football at Middlesboro High School in Kentucky, a town just across the Tennessee state line near LMU.
Tom’s grandmother, Laura Coffman, always told the story of his freshman year, coming to the dinner table and wearing a hat and her jerking it off his bald head. His head had been shaved by the senior players.
Len failed his senior year so he could play another year of high school ball. The state of Kentucky had changed its rules and said you could only play four years. Greeneville, Tn., Coach Ty Disney found my grandmother a job and a house and my grandmother, uncle and mother, Ruth, moved to Greeneville. Len played for the Greene Devils and signed with UT to play football.
In Knoxville, he met George “Bad News” Cafego and they became roommates and best friends. Cafego said about Coffman, “When you saw the back of Coffman’s neck turning red, you got out of his way.”
When the Vols began practice in 1938, General Neyland took Uncle Len to the side and described a new play he was going to insert. The play was a designed dive by the fullback over a low cutting offensive line. The play had never been used and Len spent every day practicing the play by diving over a stack of dummies time after time.
On Oct. 15, 1938, Neyland unveiled the play with Len scoring two touchdowns in a 13-0 victory over Alabama. The Vols went on to finish 11-0 with a National Championship.
Uncle Len was approached by Neyland before practice one day and Neyland said I understand you left town and went home to Greeneville. Len said he had gone to see his girlfriend. Neyland asked how far it is to Greeneville and Len said 72 miles. Neyland replied, “OK, give me 72 laps.”
In 1939 the Vols went undefeated and unscored on. They played in the Rose Bowl, and Len said, “We would have won if Clarence Brown hadn’t showed us such a good time.”
Uncle Len exploded in practice one day, and Neyland took him aside and said, “One day, Coffman, you and I are going to get mad at the same time and I am going to be the only one left to tell about it.”
Uncle Len said, “I don’t fear Neyland, I respect him.” He also said, “To play for Tennessee, you have to get wet all over.”
Teammate John Bailey said, “Coffman was the meanest, toughest football player Tennessee has ever had.”
