If this is the beginning of the end of Heupel at Tennessee—his executive decision to continue to play Joe Milton in 2023 is what prevented a breakout

[WhenUrVolUrVFL]

Love Josh Heupel. He’s done some great things for us. Couple of head scratching decisions. The biggest one being—not having Nico ready to roll in 2023.

Joe Milton was never a major starting QB. Michigan saw it right away. He has great tools, a great young man, and a great teammate.

But the way this season played out is precisely why he should have had Nico hitting the field as early as possible.

Nico played his ass off against Ohio state but it was obvious he wasn’t ready for game speed for much of this season.

don’t want to be a Debbie Downer but next year won’t be a playoff year. And then we have no idea what our schedule will look like the following year, but I think it’s going to get more difficult to recruit and this may be the high water mark of Heupel as our head coach.

I hope it’s not. But it’s going to be difficult to get back to where we were this year.

Fun year. Proud we made the playoffs. Should have had Nico ready for rush run after it was obvious Joe Milton wasn’t the guy. Instead we rode Milton for the entire 2023 season and missed the opportunity to really make progress in 2024.

 

[vik]

Love Josh Heupel. He’s done some great things for us. Couple of head scratching decisions. The biggest one being—not having Nico ready to roll in 2023.

Joe Milton was never a major starting QB. Michigan saw it right away. He has great tools, a great young man, and a great teammate.

But the way this season played out is precisely why he should have had Nico hitting the field as early as possible.

Nico played his ass off against Ohio state but it was obvious he wasn’t ready for game speed for much of this season.

don’t want to be a Debbie Downer but next year won’t be a playoff year. And then we have no idea what our schedule will look like the following year, but I think it’s going to get more difficult to recruit and this may be the high water mark of Heupel as our head coach.

I hope it’s not. But it’s going to be difficult to get back to where we were this year.

Fun year. Proud we made the playoffs. Should have had Nico ready for rush run after it was obvious Joe Milton wasn’t the guy. Instead we rode Milton for the entire 2023 season and missed the opportunity to really make progress in 2024.

Milton did fine. With Milton at QB in 2023, with the exception of a mystifying loss at Florida, we beat who we were supposed to beat, and got beat by who we were supposed to get beat by. Nico QB'd his own mystifying loss at Arkansas in 2024, and no less than Hendon Hooker himself QB'd a mystifying loss at South Carolina in 2022.

Nico wasn't ready to be the starting QB in 2023, and spent a decent chunk of last season injured.

 

[BigOrangeFanatic]

The beginning of the end will have more to do with his decision to not make staff changes, IMO. He has to replace a few guys if he wants to take the next step in competing for an SEC championship, and/or making a deep playoff run. He has reached his peak with what he currently has.

 

[jordan4vols]

The guy is in year 4 and took us from a dumpster fire 5-6 win program to the playoffs. Let’s not with the beginning of the end ridiculous talk.

 

[TartanTurff]

Sticking with Joe created a bit of a log jam at the QB slot as Nico probably won't be NFL ready next year, may not be adequately developed next year for regular competitive SEC play, McIntyre is on campus going through practices, with that super quick release, he will not sit idlely by while the Nico experiment goes into 2026 and Faizon Brandon is not coming to Tennessee to wait on anybody, but all trains are running behind while we let Joe do the 8-4 stint in 2023, the tempo on the field is one thing, train wrecking talent sequencing is another, if talent doesn't see the field, there is a well oiled portal and megadollars to help second string quarterbacks see somebody's field

 

[EZE]

Goodness…there must not be any egg nog left in VolNation.

I’m impressed at how the craziness just seems to grow and grow after a loss.

A lot of you folks might want to consider prescription meds.

 

[EZE]

Love Josh Heupel. He’s done some great things for us. Couple of head scratching decisions. The biggest one being—not having Nico ready to roll in 2023.

Joe Milton was never a major starting QB. Michigan saw it right away. He has great tools, a great young man, and a great teammate.

But the way this season played out is precisely why he should have had Nico hitting the field as early as possible.

Nico played his ass off against Ohio state but it was obvious he wasn’t ready for game speed for much of this season.

don’t want to be a Debbie Downer but next year won’t be a playoff year. And then we have no idea what our schedule will look like the following year, but I think it’s going to get more difficult to recruit and this may be the high water mark of Heupel as our head coach.

I hope it’s not. But it’s going to be difficult to get back to where we were this year.

Fun year. Proud we made the playoffs. Should have had Nico ready for rush run after it was obvious Joe Milton wasn’t the guy. Instead we rode Milton for the entire 2023 season and missed the opportunity to really make progress in 2024.

Are you seriously saying that this program didn’t make “real progress” this season? Were you living under a rock the past 20 years?

 

[SaintLouisVol]

After watching Nico play this year, there’s no way he would have survived last year.

 

[WhenUrVolUrVFL]

Are you seriously saying that this program didn’t make “real progress” this season? Were you living under a rock the past I see the writing on the wall. We’re going to be 8-4 this year and I’m not seeing the recruiting to get us over the next level.

Realistically, we may not reach the playoffs for a bit. I hope that’s not the case, but this year was missed opportunity.

Our passing game was not developed. We have some big time assets coming—but not having Nico battle ready in favor of sticking with Joe Milton shows Heupel’s flaws in making executive decisions.

Him punting when we were down 28-10 in the 3rd quarter was also a real head scratcher that not many elite coaches would have made.

 

[bpalmer28]

Guys… I’m embarrassed enough. Please stop

 

[WhenUrVolUrVFL]

Milton did fine. With Milton at QB in 2023, with the exception of a mystifying loss at Florida, we beat who we were supposed to beat, and got beat by who we were supposed to get beat by. Nico QB'd his own mystifying loss at Arkansas in 2024, and no less than Hendon Hooker himself QB'd a mystifying loss at South Carolina in 2022.

Nico wasn't ready to be the starting QB in 2023, and spent a decent chunk of last season injured.

You just made my point for me. Nico wasn’t ready in away environments. What could have been done differently to prep for that?

Also Joe Milton didn’t do fine. He was a liability. And we would have beat Bama handily with even slightly competent QB play. Missing the opportunity to have Nick ready in 2024 was a bad decision. And it was obvious to everyone in Ann Arbor, but not to you.

 

[LegionnaireOfTheMiserable]

I would like to see the world where Nico starts most of last year and if he would be any better for it this year. But odds are Nico is just another Joe Milton, regardless of how many reps he gets.

 

[jeff1vol]

100% correct. CJH has reached his ceiling if he stays status quo. There's NO doubt. His offenses have regressed the last 2 years and his DC is about as vanilla as it gets. Other coaches are hoping we roll around on the schedule before he makes any changes.

 

[WhenUrVolUrVFL]

I would like to see the world where Nico starts most of last year and if he would be any better for it this year. But odds are Nico is just another Joe Milton, regardless of how many reps he gets.

I wonder if Nico has the mental/IQ to be a really good QB. He seems like he’s a prey animal when he drops back. When he scrambles like a deer running from predators, rather than someone aggrsssivly trying to make moves and advance the ball.

He had flashes where he looked in command. But his complete inability to throw the deep ball held us back. The timing is another aspect of his game that could have been developed if he played thru 2023.

 

[tennesseeduke]

Love Josh Heupel. He’s done some great things for us. Couple of head scratching decisions. The biggest one being—not having Nico ready to roll in 2023.

Joe Milton was never a major starting QB. Michigan saw it right away. He has great tools, a great young man, and a great teammate.

But the way this season played out is precisely why he should have had Nico hitting the field as early as possible.

Nico played his ass off against Ohio state but it was obvious he wasn’t ready for game speed for much of this season.

don’t want to be a Debbie Downer but next year won’t be a playoff year. And then we have no idea what our schedule will look like the following year, but I think it’s going to get more difficult to recruit and this may be the high water mark of Heupel as our head coach.

I hope it’s not. But it’s going to be difficult to get back to where we were this year.

Fun year. Proud we made the playoffs. Should have had Nico ready for rush run after it was obvious Joe Milton wasn’t the guy. Instead we rode Milton for the entire 2023 season and missed the opportunity to really make progress in 2024.

GTFO

 

[WhenUrVolUrVFL]

100% correct. CJH has reached his ceiling if he stays status quo. There's NO doubt. His offenses have regressed the last 2 years and his DC is about as vanilla as it gets. Other coaches are hoping we roll around on the schedule before he makes any changes.

And to build on this point—recruiting is going to be tough when it starts looking like Heupel has stagnated. This was a year to capitalize on, and instead we lost opportunity by not having Nico Raady to take full advantage of this campaign.

It was obvious to anyone last year that Milton should have been ready to be sat by Florida. How Heupel Couldn’t figure that out is the point of this post. And the fact that he punted to Ohio state when our defense looked like a liability against them….some decisions he makes are just….what…

 

[volmandu]

Crazy stuff like this all over local media and folks chatter will eventually lead to Huepel bolting to OU.

 

[JMSqb11]

Love Josh Heupel. He’s done some great things for us. Couple of head scratching decisions. The biggest one being—not having Nico ready to roll in 2023.

Joe Milton was never a major starting QB. Michigan saw it right away. He has great tools, a great young man, and a great teammate.

But the way this season played out is precisely why he should have had Nico hitting the field as early as possible.

Nico played his ass off against Ohio state but it was obvious he wasn’t ready for game speed for much of this season.

don’t want to be a Debbie Downer but next year won’t be a playoff year. And then we have no idea what our schedule will look like the following year, but I think it’s going to get more difficult to recruit and this may be the high water mark of Heupel as our head coach.

I hope it’s not. But it’s going to be difficult to get back to where we were this year.

Fun year. Proud we made the playoffs. Should have had Nico ready for rush run after it was obvious Joe Milton wasn’t the guy. Instead we rode Milton for the entire 2023 season and missed the opportunity to really make progress in 2024.

I really don’t understand the doom and gloom for next year. We have a very favorable schedule to be at minimum 9-3 with a 10-2 record not being that far off.

 

[Sandman 423]

You would think that Tennessee wandering the desert of suck for over a decade would humble the fanbase, but here we are talking about a 10-2 year being the beginning of the end for the head coach.

 

[Smokey7]

Joe wasn't bad. Glad he came to UT!

 

[Vol524]

BVS is alive and well. I find it odd that we bash other fan bases for their abandon-ship attitude, and some of us are as guilty as any fan base. I do believe we need to part ways with some assistant coaches. But we will see what happens. I do think there were times when the coaches seemed to not make in-game adjustments.
We have not played great on the road this year. We lost on the road to a good team. I thought we would go 10-2 for the season. So, I will wait and see where CJH takes us. GO VOLS.

 

[DaddyChad]

It’s like Freak just said F it and let out all the stupid at the end of the year.

 

[Nicovfl8]

Love Josh Heupel. He’s done some great things for us. Couple of head scratching decisions. The biggest one being—not having Nico ready to roll in 2023.

Joe Milton was never a major starting QB. Michigan saw it right away. He has great tools, a great young man, and a great teammate.

But the way this season played out is precisely why he should have had Nico hitting the field as early as possible.

Nico played his ass off against Ohio state but it was obvious he wasn’t ready for game speed for much of this season.

don’t want to be a Debbie Downer but next year won’t be a playoff year. And then we have no idea what our schedule will look like the following year, but I think it’s going to get more difficult to recruit and this may be the high water mark of Heupel as our head coach.

I hope it’s not. But it’s going to be difficult to get back to where we were this year.

Fun year. Proud we made the playoffs. Should have had Nico ready for rush run after it was obvious Joe Milton wasn’t the guy. Instead we rode Milton for the entire 2023 season and missed the opportunity to really make progress in 2024.

What I said all year last year, Milton was in his 6th year and never was gonna be better. Get Nico ready and so much better this year.

 

[NighthawkVol]

Love Josh Heupel. He’s done some great things for us. Couple of head scratching decisions. The biggest one being—not having Nico ready to roll in 2023.

Joe Milton was never a major starting QB. Michigan saw it right away. He has great tools, a great young man, and a great teammate.

But the way this season played out is precisely why he should have had Nico hitting the field as early as possible.

Nico played his ass off against Ohio state but it was obvious he wasn’t ready for game speed for much of this season.

don’t want to be a Debbie Downer but next year won’t be a playoff year. And then we have no idea what our schedule will look like the following year, but I think it’s going to get more difficult to recruit and this may be the high water mark of Heupel as our head coach.

I hope it’s not. But it’s going to be difficult to get back to where we were this year.

Fun year. Proud we made the playoffs. Should have had Nico ready for rush run after it was obvious Joe Milton wasn’t the guy. Instead we rode Milton for the entire 2023 season and missed the opportunity to really make progress in 2024.

Some of y’all are certifiably insane.

 

[RDU VOL#14]

Tennessee makes the the College Football Playoff.

Tennessee Fans:


Unbelievable