KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — President Donald Trump's visit to Tennessee's college football game against Texas on Saturday validated the push to get fans inside Neyland Stadium earlier than usual, as spectators heeded the call and streamed in well before.

Security checks along the stadium's perimeter went relatively smoothly after Tennessee officials opened the gates 30 minutes earlier than normal. Early arrivals were rewarded with half-price concessions, and the stands were half full 90 minutes before kickoff and nearly packed an hour before.

Those in their seats were treated to a low-altitude flyover by Air Force One as the president came into town with the Volunteers and Longhorns warming up on the field below. Trump landed at 11:28 a.m. ET, ahead of the noon kickoff, according to reporters traveling with the president.

Trump's motorcade reached Neyland Stadium just as national anthem was being sung at 11:59 a.m. When he appeared on the videoboards in his seat, flanked by Tennessee's two U.S. senators, he pumped his fist a couple of times. One of the senators, Marsha Blackburn, is running for governor of Tennessee.

Thanks to coordination before Saturday's game, the president's visit was not expected to affect communications between coaches and players on the field.

Longhorns coach Steve Sarkisian said earlier this week that teams had to be ready to lose all headset communication between coaches on the field and players "anytime (Trump) enters the stadium, leaves the stadium or changes locations within the stadium."

ABC/ESPN reported Saturday that both schools worked with the Secret Service on audio channels in hopes of keeping communications clear, noting that an official timeout could be an option in the event of a serious disruption. The real test of that planning would come whenever the president moved, the scenarios coaches had spent the week preparing to manage.

The Southeastern Conference matchup between the No. 1 Longhorns and No. 14 Volunteers in Knoxville was already one of the biggest games in the country this weekend. Trump came to watch Texas quarterback Arch Manning play for the first time in the stadium where his uncle, Peyton, became famous.

Trump has attended more college football games than any recent sitting president, and he arrived in Knoxville in the midst of a midterm election season and a heated debate over the role of money in college sports that Congress is trying to resolve. He has attended national championship games and regular-season contests in the SEC, as well as Army vs. Navy. Each of those stops has required host venues to fold presidential-security logistics into a normal game operation.

He also attended Game 3 of the NBA Finals between the New York Knicks and San Antonio Spurs in June, went to the 2025 Daytona 500, and presented the World Cup trophy to Spain at the final in July. Last year, he became the first president to attend a Super Bowl, though he left after halftime.

Headset communications emerged as the latest subplot surrounding the presidential visit. Coaches communicate with one another on their headsets throughout the game and also call in plays to the quarterback. Disruptions to those communications — whether from a deafening crowd, a technical glitch or a presidential security measure — can present problems for coaches and teams. Unlike crowd noise or a technical glitch, though, a security-driven outage follows the president's schedule rather than the flow of the game, leaving staffs to plan for silence at unpredictable moments.

Coaches involved in last season's College Football Playoff championship between Miami and Indiana in New Orleans cited that game as an example of how Trump's movements affected them.

Trump left in the fourth quarter of a tense Indiana 27-21 victory. Sarkisian said Miami coach Mario Cristobal told him that Trump's departure at that point disrupted communications on the Hurricanes' final possession, which ended with a game-clinching interception.

Indiana coach Curt Cignetti disputed Sarkisian's version of events surrounding the final drive. But Cignetti acknowledged that communications briefly cut off at a key moment of the fourth quarter as Indiana was trying to protect its lead.

On his weekly radio show Thursday, Cignetti recalled that when Trump left the game "around the 7-minute mark … there were two or three plays we couldn't hear at all." That stretch included a misdirection touchdown run by Miami's Malachi Toney.

"Communication device came back right after the (Toney's) touchdown," Cignetti said. "And we had no problem the rest of the game."

According to the media pool report of Trump's movements at the game, the president left the stadium "with just under 8 minutes left in the 4th quarter."

The White House on Friday insisted that Trump's departure caused no problems for the teams. "No, President Trump's departure from the CFP championship in January did not cause headset or comms issues for the teams," the White House posted on X.

It is unclear whether Trump's presence at other games, such as the Super Bowl, has created similar issues. An NFL spokesman declined comment Friday when asked whether league officials work with the Secret Service when a president attends a game like the Super Bowl to minimize any impact on team communications.

University of Tennessee officials sent a midweek advisory encouraging fans to arrive "significantly earlier" than for a typical game. Neyland Stadium has an official capacity of 101,915, and Saturday marked the 30th consecutive sellout.

Fans were warned that the Secret Service would conduct enhanced screening at the stadium gates and to "expect increased wait times as kickoff approaches."

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com.