By WAYNE PHILLIPS

Sports Editor

KNOXVILLE -- You hear the term "shooting ourselves in the foot" often by sports teams. If that were taken in literal terms, Tennessee's football team would have no limbs left after losing to Florida 30-6 Saturday afternoon at Neyland Stadium.

Tennessee's offense lost two fumbles in the "orange zone," plus they had a pass picked off in the end zone, and the offense gave the defense no help in trying to break the Gators' stranglehold on UT's football fortunes.

The end result was another Florida (3-0, 1-0) lop-sided victory, sending UT's crowd grumbling and heading for the exits long before the action was completed on the field. The Vols are now 1-2 on the season, 0-1 in the SEC, and things don't get a bit easier as they head to Auburn on Saturday for another league encounter.

"That loss is on me," Coach Phillip Fulmer said after the game. "I've got big shoulders; I can take it. That wasn't us. The penalties, the orange-area efforts ... we never gave our defense really a chance."

It was a day when the UT defense turned in a stellar performance, holding the vaunted Gator offense to only 243 yds. Tim Tebow, Florida's Heisman Trophy winning quarterback, had just 96 yds. passing, a career low in 16 games as a starter, and his 26 rushing yards were the second lowest total of his career since becoming the Gators' starter in 2007.

Still, that was nowhere enough to overcome the turnovers, a rash of penalties, and a kicking game that went totally south, allowing Brandon James to once again burn them with a kickoff return to open the game that set the Gators up in good field position, and later in the first quarter a punt return for a touchdown.

"Our team ... it seems like we've got to learn things the hard way," Fulmer said. "As a coach, last year's team was one of those teams that drove you nuts, but they got better and better. We played for the (SEC) championship in Atlanta when a lot of other people had given up on us early. We won't give up, and we have a chance to be there again. It's just a little bit harder road."

But the road looks extremely rough and bumpy this year. Offensive coordinator David Cutcliffe is gone, and quarterback Jonathan Crompton is struggling getting his team into the end zone.

"We shot ourselves in the foot," Crompton said. "We should have won the ball game, in my opinion. We gave up 14 points in the red zone. We moved the ball great at times on offense. We stopped ourselves."

Florida scored on its first possession after James' kickoff return to start the game was good for 52 yds. to the UT 44. Tebow worked a bit of his magic, firing a jump pass over the defense from the 2-yd. line to a wide open tight end Aaron Hernandez.

The Vols got into immediate trouble on their first possession of the game. Senior tailback Arian Foster got flagged for a personal foul after pushing a Florida defender who was obviously jawing at him. Then Crompton hit Montario Hardesty on a short pass, and Hardesty fumbled after a big hit, with Ryan Stamper recovering at the UT 22.

Three plays later, Jonathan Phillips made the first of three field goals on the day, a 39-yarder, and the lead was 10-0 halfway through the opening quarter.

The Gators weren't through. UT got one first down but had to punt, and punter Chad Cunningham failed to get the ball away from Brandon James. James dodged a couple of tacklers after the catch of the punt, and found a small hole, which was good enough for him to dash into the clear. The return was good for 78 yards and a score, and the Vols were behind 17-0 and it was becoming painfully clear that this UT team was in no way going to be able to compete with Florida.

Tennessee then kept the ball for 14 plays, driving all the way from their own 26 to the Gator 1-yd. line, before fumbling it away when Crompton stuck the ball out too quickly and it grazed the leg of the fullback and squirted free. Carlos Dunlap recovered for Florida.

The Gators kept the ball for 12 plays, moved 75 yds., and got a 40-yd. field goal from Phillips to up the lead to 20-0.

The Vols had yet another good drive, starting at the 39 and moving back to Florida's 1-yd. line as time was running out in the half. Poor clock management left the Vols in bad shape. They called their final time out with 16 seconds left, after allowing about that much time to run off the clock before calling time. On third down, Crompton passed incomplete in the end zone, then on fourth down, Crompton's pass was picked off in the end zone by Janoris Jenkins.

Florida made it 27-0 in the third quarter on a 15-yd. TD pass from Tebow to Percy Harvin, sending the fans were leaving in droves. Many didn't see UT's only touchdown of the game, which came early in the fourth quarter on a 1-yd. plunge by Crompton. The two-point conversion pass failed. The TD was set up on an 11-yd. pass from Crompton to tight end Luke Stocker, who was initially ruled to have a score after the completion, but the call was reversed after a review when it was determined Stocker's knee touched before he stretched across the goal line.

Florida tacked on another field goal, a 27-yarder by Phillips, for good measure in the final quarter.

"We really controlled the line of scrimmage," Coach Urban Meyer of Florida said. "I think (Arian Foster) is one of the best backs in college football. We held him in check. We loaded the box pretty good. We wanted them to be one-dimensional."

* Fulmer said during his Sunday night teleconference with reporters that he would not be changing quarterbacks this week.

"Jon's our quarterback," he said.

* Saturday's game at Auburn is set for a 3:30 p.m. start with CBS again providing the telecast.

Florida 17 3 7 3--30

Tennessee 0 0 0 6--6

First Quarter

UF - A. Hernandez, 2-yd. pass from T. Tebow (J. Phillips kick)

UF - J. Phillips, 39-yd. field goal

UF - B. James, 78-yd. punt return (J.Phillips kick)

Second Quarter

UF - J. Phillips, 40-yd. field goal

Third Quarter

UF - P. Harvin, 15-yd. pass from T. Tebow (Phillips kick)

Fourth Quarter

UT - Jonathan Crompton, 1-yd. run (pass failed)

UF - J. Phillips, 27-yd. field goal

UF UT

FirstDowns 16 16

Passing 15-8-0 28-18-1

Yds.Passing 96 162

Yds. Rushing 147 96

Total Offense 243 258

Fumbles Lost 0 2

Penalties 9-57 9-95

Punt Avg. 1-57 4-37.5

Individual Stats:

Rushing: Florida - E.Moody 9-55; C. Rainey 9-42; P.Harvin 6-31; T.Tebow 12-26. Tennessee - A.Foster 14-37; J. Crompton 7-22; G.Jones 4-18; M.Hardesty 5-15. Passing: Florida - Tebow 15-8-0-2-96; Tennessee-Crompton 28-18-1-0-162. Receiving: Florida - P.Harvin 2-49-1; Murphy 2-18-0; Hernandez 2-15-1. Tennessee - G.Jones 4-40-0; Stocker 3-25-0.