If I had an extra car, I would paint it orange and saw it in half. 

        That’s what Tennessee linebacker Jack Reynolds did after a disappointing loss to Ole Miss in 1969. It was bizarre enough to make national news and earn him the nickname “Hacksaw.” 

            Now, here’s the thing. Most of us fans didn’t consider what he did to be an overreaction. I don’t think we would have thought it all that outrageous if he had chopped a vehicle in two and eaten half of it. A few hundred pounds of sheet metal would have been easier to swallow than that 38-0 loss. 

             It is a testament to the power of college football in the South that insanity doesn’t seem unreasonable. After a win, civil disobedience is almost a duty — you and 30,000 other normally law-abiding citizens feel like tearing the goalposts down and throwing them in the Tennessee River. Civil disobedience, destruction of property, “yaaaay team.” 

                After a loss you feel like throwing yourself in the Tennessee River. 

             The game means that much. I have heard it said that short of a Billy Graham Crusade there is nothing else like it, and I couldn’t have argued with that – until earlier this week. 

             When Lady Vol Emma Clark hit a walk-off home run against Texas Tech, I was ready to storm the field, tear down the backstop and throw it in the Tennessee River. And this happened in Oklahoma City, which would mean carrying that backstop 800 miles, which I felt like I would have done happily, singing “Rocky Top” every step of the way.  

              Then when pitcher and goddess Karlyn Pickens lost to Texas, my wife and I were ready to throw each other into the river. We moped around all day, refused to pet the cat, didn’t feel like eating supper, and barely spoke. When we did, it was mostly repeating phrases along the lines of, “I can’t believe we couldn’t” and “if only” and “what happened to our bats?” 

             Unreasonable? Irrational? Downright Looney Tunes? Yes, yes, yes. We realize that, we know it does us no good, but we can’t help it. It happens a lot at our house, but usually only in the fall. 

              And with that, I will pay the highest compliment I can think of to the current state of women’s softball. When those Women’s College World Series games were being played, it felt like a football Saturday. 

             From all the assorted expressions of anguish I’ve seen on social media, a lot of people out there feel the same way. There was no joy in many Mudvilles this week. 

             It’s a little scary to think that women now have another way of breaking our hearts, but overall, it’s good news. We wouldn’t be moping around if it didn’t matter. And that sends a message to some youngsters I think very highly of – Libby, who used to watch our cats and now is at West Point; Grace and Carson who used throw the ball around with me in fourth grade; goddaughter Anastasia who played her way through college.  

              It tells them, “What you do can matter as much as what the boys do.” 

             This I believe to be a turning point in women’s sports and the ongoing efforts for gender equity in college athletics. The government can legislate things like Title IX, insist on fairness, and oversee the distribution of scholarship money. Stuff like that can be demanded and granted. 

             If you want people to really care about the game, you have to earn it on the field. 

             That’s when the hacksaws come out.