Kellie Harper's Tennessee football fandom was born in 1998. Now it's rubbing off on her son

Kellie Harper will be out recruiting Saturday – but if she had a choice she'd be in Athens, Georgia.

The Tennessee Lady Vols basketball coach walked into the office Sunday faking a cough, she said at the Knoxville Rotary Club on Tuesday.

"Am I coming down with something? Not sure if I can make it on Saturday," Harper joked. "And they said, 'Oh, is the weather better in Athens?' So I'll have to make sure that my phone is charged, I've got my earbuds in and I'm going to multitask like nobody's business on Saturday."

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Harper is one of the biggest Tennessee football fans on campus and said she got a couple funny looks when she told her team "Happy Gator hater week" the Monday before the Florida game. But after the Vols' 8-0 start to the season, the team is starting to understand it.

"I told them, 'This is how it used to feel every single week. This is how it feels," Harper said. "So now they're like, 'Oh, this is why you're like that.'"

Harper always loved football growing up, but the 1998 undefeated championship season when she was a student at Tennessee created a super fan. Harper recalls the team was late to a Thanksgiving banquet that fall because they were watching the Tennessee vs. Arkansas game – but witnessing the thrilling win on a late-game fumble was worth it.

"When I came to Tennessee my love (for football) grew as I was here," Harper told Knox News. "Obviously, the success of the of the football team in the late 90s was a big part of that."

A video of Harper wearing out her vocal chords at the Alabama game this season went viral on Twitter. She later said at the women's basketball SEC media day three days later she had just regained her voice.

"We have the signs that say 'Give your all for Tennessee,' and I figured if I step into the stadium, I gotta give my all," Harper said. "You will continue to see me acting a fool at the other sports' games."

Another emerging super fan in the Harper family

Harper gets into the games at home almost as much as she does at Neyland. Her husband, Jon, is the opposite.

"Jon is very stoic," Harper said. "He's cool, he doesn't get too overly excited. He has threatened to film me watching games. Most of the time I'm pretty good watching at home. But I don't want to be bothered."

Her passion is rubbing off on her son, Jackson, though.

Jackson already knows what he wants for his ninth birthday in November. The long list includes football gloves, even though he wants to be a quarterback – but that's neither here nor there.

Experiencing this season, especially the upset over Alabama to end a 15-game losing streak, is creating another fan for life in the Harper family.

Jackson adores Tennessee quarterback and Heisman Trophy candidate Hendon Hooker, Harper said, and watching her son grow into his love for football has been "so much fun."

"We throw football in our kitchen every single night," Harper said. "Now, I do realize that I'm the cool mom because I throw football with my son in the house. But it is a daily thing with him now."

But it's more than just love for the game that makes Harper happy. As a coach, Harper understands how special Tennessee players' relationships with the community is.

"But as a parent, I'm getting to see the other side of it," she said. "And it means a lot to me, for him to have people to look up to and and to have passion for something like that."

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: How Tennessee coach Kellie Harper passed football fandom on to her son