How good is Tennessee, really?
No. 24 Tennessee at No. 17 Pitt (3:30 p.m., ABC)
It was pretty jarring to realize that (a) my SP+ ratings made me uncomfortable with how much they liked Tennessee this offseason (the Vols came into the season ranked 10th), and (b) SP+ still drastically underestimated the Vols in Week 1. It projected them as favorites of 31.1 points against Ball State last Thursday night, and the Vols won by 49. They led by double digits seven minutes in and were covering before halftime.
Is Ball State amazing? No. But that was baked into the projections Tennessee exceeded.
Now comes a completely different test. Pitt beat the Vols in Knoxville last season in the last game before Hendon Hooker took over as Tennessee's starting quarterback. (Hooker subbed in and went 15-for-21 for 188 yards, plus 49 rushing yards.) Tennessee is a lot more with-it now, but the game's in Pittsburgh. Pat Narduzzi's Panthers might be a perfect early test for an ambitious team -- good enough to beat you if you're not as good as you hope you are, but perhaps not good enough to brush aside a really good team's A-game. West Virginia landed a few more blows than expected in last Thursday's Backyard Brawl, but the Panthers survived 38-31 thanks to Kedon Slovis' 308 passing yards and an incredibly well-timed pick-six from M.J. Devonshire.
Pitt played at one of the slowest tempos in the country last week and created lots of havoc against WVU (eight tackles for loss, nine passes defensed). Tennessee played at a ridiculously high tempo against BSU -- this is a Josh Heupel team, after all -- and forced the issue on defense but missed a lot of tackles. Pitt attempts controlled chaos, and Tennessee just takes the regulator off and starts swinging. If the Vols overachieve projections like they did last Thursday, they're going to win pretty comfortably, and we might have to come to grips with living in a world in which Tennessee genuinely has its act together. It's been a while. Let's see if it comes to pass.
Current line: Vols -6 (no movement since Sunday) | SP+ projection: Tennessee by 7.1 | FPI projection: Tennessee by 1.4.
Finally, SP+'s adoration of the Vols gets a serious test.
