Less than a week away from fall camp, it's hard to believe it's almost that time of year again. Obviously, last year, with the season and the coaching change/infractions, was nothing short of a disaster. Unfortunately, UT has not been able to get the stink of constant turnover, scandal, and drama off of itself for going on 15 years. There's no denying that the brand has been tarnished, and UT does not have the same appeal it did when I was a kid (essentially the whole Fulmer era). However, I believe the program almost needed to hit rock bottom in order to clean house and get rid of the old way of thinking that has held Tennessee back for so long. Sometimes in life, it's not until you've hit rock bottom and you're faced with the consequences of all the poor decisions you've made that you become desperate and are truly ready to change. I believe Tennessee finally reached that point this off-season. That's why I'm excited.
What has changed? First of all, we're at a spot with the potential penalties looming and all the transfers in the off-season that expectations temporarily have been lowered. At least that is the perception. I'm not excited that expectations are lower right now, but I'm glad that this actually might work in Tennessee's favor to give the coach some time to get the program back on track. A great coach can get a program going usually in the first 3-4 years, but Tennesee has not hired a great coach after Fulmer was fired (Kiffin probably being the best) and so 3-4 years was never going to work out in meeting the fans expectations. Butch was the most qualified and got the closest out of all of the experiments, but still, things went downhill... fast. Who's to say that the Heupel era will be any different? Sure, he may get the program up to 8 wins like Butch and even Pruitt, but how is he any different?
Aside from the special circumstances mentioned above, here are 3 reasons why I believe this hire was different:
1. The restrictor plates are off.
In my lifetime of 29 years of watching the Vols, Tennessee's calling card for the majority of my life has been ball control, grind it out, play great defense, just don't mess things up and you have a chance to win. While this worked for Fulmer until the mid-2000s came along, times have changed. They've been changed... for a while now. And you've seen for going on the majority of the last 15 years that we've been oblivious to that fact. Just within the last 5 years even, college football has seen a dramatic shift to an even more offensive game. Tennesee finally hired a coach whose philosophy is modern yet unique. In this day and age, especially with rules changes and the physicality of the game waning, offenses have such a drastic advantage over defenses. Not only that, the sophistication of the schemes on offense and the overall 7 on 7 culture and training starting from youth has made players much more advanced and offenses much more difficult to defend. It's getting harder and harder to win games without scoring at least 30 points... and that's against the average teams. The good teams? You can almost forget about winning if you aren't putting up 40-50 points against the big boys. You can't win meaningful games in this era by being conservative. Finally, we have a coach who is going to "let it rip" and gives us a shot at putting up serious points. Win or lose, I believe we will be competitive in the majority of our games going forward based on this change in mentality alone.
2. The "System" is the star.
This point is really why I wanted to make this whole post. This whole off-season, I've spent more time actually analyzing the game of football more than I ever have before. I've transitioned from just being a fan to being more of a student of the game. It actually started during last season when I got so desperately upset and bored with Tennessee this past year, that I actually contemplated having a side team to root for. I started to really like Ole Miss (yes, I admit it). It wasn't because of some weird obsession I had with Lane Kiffin unlike some of our fans, it was because, win or lose, they were actually FUN to watch. Football is supposed to be fun. So this, in addition to the news that Josh Heupel could be an option for the Tenn HC job (which ended up being the case, obviously) prompted me to start doing some research. Researching Josh Heupel's offense led me back to the Art Briles days at Baylor (especially from 2011-2015). Here's what I found out. Josh Heupel was the OC at Oklahoma from 2011-14 while Briles was the HC at Baylor from 08-15. In the 31 games they have played against each other in history, Baylor has beaten Oklahoma 3 times. All 3 of those wins came between 2011-14 with 2012 only being an 8 point loss. While you may say that doesn't look good on our current head coach, the point of sharing all of that was to say that after Heupel was fired after 2014, starting in 2016, he completely changed his offense. I have heard that he went and spent a lot of time with Briles at Baylor after his firing and learned this system which is/was supposedly kept pretty secret. He didn't implement it until 2016 when he was hired as OC at Missouri and ever since he has been tweaking and refining how he wants to run the system. Briles' teams scored 45, 44, 51, and 46 PPG those years. It's my opinion that after Heupel saw this superior system firsthand 4 years in a row, he wanted in on the fun.
Here's what you need to know about the Briles' system: the scheme probably would fall under what they used to call the Veer and Shoot. Basically, the way Briles ran it and the way Heupel runs it (although there are slight differences) is extremely vertical in nature. Whether it is run or pass, most plays are going vertical rather than side to side. The uniqueness of this system is that it is almost exclusively hurry-up no-huddle where they snap the ball with a lot of time left on the clock with the intention of not giving the defense time to get ready mentally or physically and making it almost impossible to substitute which wears the defense down and can provide match up advantages. They will slow it down some on 3rd downs, especially longer distance downs. Here's what I really want our fanbase to understand about this offensive system. Briles, Heupel, and even Kiffin to a degree (he has put his own twist on it) runs this system, and they not only put up a lot of points, but almost every starting player who plays in this system also ends up being recognized as a beast. Quarterbacks: Robert Griffin III, Bryce Petty, Drew Lock, McKenzie Milton, Dillon Gabriel, Matt Corral... all of those guys ended up being nationally recognized. Even guys you may have never heard of like Nick Florence at Baylor in 2012 taking over for RGIII threw for 4300 yards and 33 touchdowns. Running Backs Terrance Ganaway, Lache Seastrunk, Shock Linwood, Johnny Jefferson, Damarea Crockett, Ish Witter, and Greg McRae all ran for over 1000 yards in this system with others getting close to this mark. Wide Receivers Kendall Wright, Terrance Williams, Antwan Goodley, Corey Coleman, KD Cannon, J'Mon Moore, Gabriel Davis, Marlon Williams, and Elijah Moore all had seasons eclipsing 1000 yards with others getting close to this mark.
What's the Point? Not all of those guys are super talented, freak athletes. In fact, most were lower-rated recruits. When is the last time Tennessee had a 3000 yard passer, 1000 yard rusher, or a 1000 yard receiver. 2012 maybe? Now I realize stats don't always equal wins but realize this... this is being done at Baylor, Missouri, UCF, and Ole Miss. These are not your big boy programs. Tennessee has not been in the upper-echelon of football programs in a long time, but we still recruit better than all of those teams. Also, compared to the talent on hand, I believe most of those teams overperformed with this offensive system as far as wins and losses go. I know Baylor completely turned their program around under it. Being where we are, we really need some competitive advantage or equalizer to help us get back to where we used to be. There are maybe a handful of systems (offensive in particular but defensively also to complement) out there that I can think of (i.e. Mike Leach's Air Raid) that actually work and are great competitive equalizers. This Briles' system is certainly one of those and is really fun to watch. I won't predict we will be in it until the end against Bama, Georgia, or Florida this year, but at the same time, I could see it happening. Would you have thought Ole Miss would have taken Bama almost down to the wire in 2020? Me either. There is some secret sauce in this system that I love. It's not dependent on having the most talent which I think is exactly what Tennessee needs because right now they just can't stack up with the top teams in the conference in recruiting.
3. Combination of the Coach's Attributes
Josh Heupel, in my opinion, is one of the more underrated coaches out there. He has a unique combination of pedigree, being an actual "football guy" playing and coaching at a high level for a long time, being perceived as a genuinely good/likable person, and answering one of my biggest questions with him this off-season in his ability to hire good coaches. He knocked it out of the park on the staff IMO, especially on defense. People have questioned if he will recruit... I don't see this being as big of a deal due to the last point about his offensive system being a huge equalizer. However, I believe he will need to recruit elite players for defense. He has some elite defensive coaches so let's see how that turns out. He has shown he can go get some guys out of the transfer portal which I think can also accelerate the rebuild. I think once the NCAA cloud passes he will recruit just fine.
At the end of the day, wins and losses are really all that people care about, but due to the context of the situation of what we're coming out of I think Heupel will get the time he needs to start getting those wins. If he starts winning ahead of schedule, look out. I think his attacking offensive and defensive style, his really fun and effective offense that can be successful with relatively any caliber of player, and also his combination of football pedigree, coaching, and personality are why I'm buying some serious stock in the Josh Heupel led Vols going forward.
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