Meet the Tennessee Fans Behind the Successful 'Checker Neyland Stadium' Idea

KNOXVILLE, Tenn.—As fans filed in Neyland Stadium, Spencer Barnett sat beside his wife in Section FF, nervously watching and expecting the worst.

It had been less than two weeks since the 37-year-old graphic design and layout artist from Cleveland, Tennessee, conceived his "Checker Neyland" campaign designed for Volunteers fans to wear orange or white (depending on the section where they sat) for UT's home tilt with Florida. 

Relying on 102,455 people to follow through with your plan was nerve-wracking, and Barnett had his doubts.

"Even up till when I was walking in there, I was worried thinking, 'This is going to look like crap and be a joke for ESPN to run with,'" Barnett said following UT's game against the Gators.

Over in Section AA, Tim McLeod was a little more cautiously optimistic.

The 36-year-old Knoxville resident who'd taken Barnett's idea, launched a website and coordinated the plan with the university, had the data to back the belief that Vols fans everywhere had bought into the concept.

This was going to work, he thought. But as the fans filed in, even he let some concern creep into his mind.

"We expected there to be some spottiness," McLeod said.

There wasn't.

Tennessee fans—and even some Gators—successfully and beautifully checkered Neyland. The result was even more unbelievable than Barnett's originally conceived picture. Once fans reached their seats, the stadium was awash perfectly in UT's traditional orange-and-white checkerboards.

As the sun-soaked stadium prepared to come alive with the fans screaming the Vols on in unison, they already had come together to make Barnett's plan a reality. 

"It was almost to an extent like a dream," Barnett said. "I kept thinking I was going to wake up.

"To see this idea that me, here in Cleveland, Tennessee, made and put out there turning into what it did was a surreal moment to me. It was like an ultimate fan experience for me because I got to see what I wanted to with Neyland Stadium."

The Idea

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Back on September 13, Barnett did what most other UT fans were doing that night. He settled in front of his television to watch the young Vols take on the Oklahoma Sooners in Norman.

Prior to the game, the ABC cameras panned Memorial Stadium, where fans had striped the crowd in crimson and cream. If 82,000 fans could do it, Barnett thought, so could 102,000.

UT had checkered the Thompson-Boling Arena for a basketball game back in 2006, so that gave Barnett even more inspiration.

He found a picture of Neyland Stadium to near-full capacity, opened his Photoshop software and began designing what UT's hallowed stadium would look like if they could get the fans to coordinate a checkerboard pattern.

Normally, Barnett—a UT grad who was there during the Peyton Manning era and the 1998 national championship—plays around with uniform concepts or UT-related pictures. When he posts his modified images on his Twitter account (@CleVOLander), there's a modest group of people who comment on or retweet it.

Barnett's "Checker Neyland" picture went viral.

After UT's 34-10 loss to OU, the Vols had an off week. That downtime allowed fans pretty much everywhere to see the picture.

"I kept watching how much it was doing," Barnett said. "It just kept growing and growing."

McLeod was one of those fans who saw the picture and approached his coworker, Jonathan Briehl, about taking Barnett's idea a step further.

To simplify the fans' experience they wanted to build a website (www.checkerneyland.com) where fans could type in their section number and it would instruct them on which color to wear.

The duo contacted Barnett, who gave the idea his blessing. Within 24 hours, McLeod and Briehl went live with the site.

What happened next was unexpected.

"There were 15,000 visits in the first 12 hours," McLeod said. "By the time the game got here, we ended up having 325,000 page views."

If there was enough interest from fans, McLeod planned to contact UT's marketing department to back it. As it turned out, he didn't have to. By Sunday, his phone rang.

"They," he said, "contacted us."

UT vetted McLeod and Briehl, making certain the concepts they presented when it came to laying out what sections would wear what color would actually work. When everything checked out, the plan became a go.

UTSports.com backed the campaign, began promoting it, and then just waited to see if fans would respond. What transpired in just nine days was one of the coolest things you'll see in college football this season.

Pulling It Off

"This was a huge thing for them to go out on a limb," McLeod said of UT. "The success or failure of this, I think, would have affected their marketing, their recruiting. But it says a lot about the confidence and faith they have in the program."

The Vol Nation—or "Vol Family," as Barnett likes to call UT's fans—responded resoundingly.

Hosting one of its largest contingents of recruits for any game this year, according to GoVols247's Ryan Callahan (subscription required) and blaring Lil' Jon's music over the loudspeakers, Tennessee appeared primed to break out and take the next step in its program.

The fact that so many people bought in to the "Checker Neyland" concept showed that the fans believed in the Vols and wanted to do their part in dressing to celebrate a win. Though that didn't happen as UT fell 10-9 to the Gators for their 10th consecutive loss in the series, the color-coordinated stadium was a positive to all involved.

"I liked the atmosphere up there, knowing that it was 100,000 fans," instate running back prospect Ke'Shawn Vaughn told Volquest.com's Paul Fortenberry (subscription required). "I didn't think they could pull it off with the Gators fans in there but they did."

The recruits loved it, media loved it and the players did, too.

The vast majority of people in the stadium participated, and McLeod said even some Gators he saw did. The only sections of Neyland not emblazoned by orange or white were the designated Florida areas.

Some fans even bought bags of white shirts to pass out to people who hadn't gotten the memo.

"I think it’s a combination of the hope in what Butch is doing with the program and the hunger we have for wins," McLeod said. "I think those are the things that drove it."

Barnett was glad he got to see it.

Unsure whether he could go to the game, he honestly answered a question from former Vol and Knoxville radio personality Jayson Swain about where he'd be watching. 

"Swain asked where I'd be sitting, and I said, 'Hopefully, in front of a TV somewhere where I can see it,'" Barnett said with a chuckle.

"Well, he didn't like that answer. By the end of the day, he'd hooked me up with some tickets."

So he and his wife, Kirbie, left their two daughters Layla and Peayton (yes, of course that's who she's named after, with a twist on the spelling) back in Cleveland and were Knoxville-bound. 

Nervous excitement crowded the car, but Kirbie was just relieved a week filled with interviews and extra attention was about over.

Though the pregame festivities in Knoxville are always fun, the Barnetts wanted to get to their seats and watch the crowd. Here's an idea of what he saw, via a time-lapse package put together by the Knoxville News-Sentinel's Adam Lau.

"I guess even though the loss to Florida sucked, to me, the day was a win," Barnett said. "I'm still hyped up. I had fun watching it as the stadium was filling in."

What's Next?

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So, after the immense success of "Checker Neyland," what's next?

"We don't want to lose the novelty of it," McLeod said, "but we'd love to turn it into a tradition."

Given the success of the first go-around, the possibilities of that are likely strong.

But even if it doesn't, Barnett will always have Saturday's game.

Life will settle back down, and the attention will go away. Kirbie went back to work for Amazon on Sunday. With school photo season in full swing, Barnett has some long hours ahead of him designing picture borders and backgrounds, which is his daily job.

But as time fades, Barnett's ticket stub will remain a treasure he'll display in a shadowbox, commemorating the day when a regular fan from an East Tennessee interstate stop had an idea that bloomed into something special. 

He didn't run through the 'T' or trot onto the field for a play, but Barnett's version of Neyland Stadium stepped into the spotlight for a day, even if Barnett was just a man standing in its shadows. 

"I still have my ticket," he said, fishing it out of his wallet to remind himself of the section where he sat. "I won’t get rid of that, especially today’s ticket.

"That way, when I’m old and senile, I can look at it and remember it."

All quotes gathered firsthand and all recruiting information taken from 247Sports.com, unless otherwise noted.

Brad Shepard covers SEC football and is the Tennessee Lead Writer for Bleacher Report. Follow Brad on Twitter @Brad_Shepard.