KNOXVILLE, Tenn.—In this, the 105th installment of the Third Saturday in October, the smell of victory smacked you in the face. It burned the nostrils, filled the senses, watered the eyes. It rose like a fog over an orange-splashed field.
The cigars surfaced in all shapes and sizes. Long and skinny, short and fat. Lit and unlit (but mostly lit). Some were wrapped in gold bands, others in brown or black. Men and women smoked them. The older generation smoked them and the younger generation smoked them, too.
One man riding atop the uprooted goal posts—hauled out of the stadium by fans like a glittering white casket—smoked a cigar, as well.
