Even with a pleasant mountain breeze swirling through the foothills of the Smokies, Zack Roskop had to close his doors and windows once 3:30 struck. The game of the millennium was in town.
Sixth-ranked Tennessee welcomed No. 3 Alabama to Knoxville; the third Saturday in October finally had postseason ramifications for the first time in nearly two decades.
Thirty-three years a Knoxvillian and owner of Knox Brew Hub in the city’s downtown, Roskop knows exactly how loud Neyland Stadium gets on any given Saturday, much less this one. He and his diehard patrons couldn’t have the outcome spoiled by the seismic crowd noise and celebratory fireworks otherwise audible from the hallowed ground, located less than a mile away.
