Welcome to game week with Josh Heupel

Welcome to Game Week, as Tennessee takes on Virginia coming up on Saturday in Nashville. Tennessee head coach, Josh Heupel sat down with Volquest to discuss the up coming season.

Does the competitor in you, when you have the season you had last year and you win the Orange Bowl, wish you had more games to play?

“It’s been a long time since, we’ve been on the field together,” Heupel said. “You know, that’s a great way to finish the season to culminate everything that had transpired. By the time you get to that point in the season, you have almost a month of buildup to know that that’s the end of the season. It feels like the end of the season. I’d love to be in that locker room with all those guys still today but I love this football team and we’re ready to start this journey in the 23 season. It’s been a lot of fun all off season building, you know, the leadership, the traits, the physical and mental toughness, growing as a football team collectively, but it’s time to go play ball.”

When you look at this team, how would you describe this team being different than last year’s group?

“Man, I think every season takes on its own identity,” Heupel said. “There’s a lot of forming your group in the off season through training camp at the same time. Like you form your identity during the course of the season too. And I’ll tell you what this group has been. Of the three teams that we’ve had, this has been the most mature. This has been the most consistent. They’ve been very intentional in the way that they’ve worked. We’ve developed great leadership, the attributes, the characteristics that we talk about inside our building.

And you know, that’s why I’m really excited about, where we’re at today and where we got a chance to go.”

You look at last year’s team. There’s some guys on that team that didn’t start their career here, transferred in and made themselves Tennessee legends. In a lot of ways. It feels like you all have done just a phenomenal job in the transfer portal. What goes into that and why do you think you’ve been so successful?

“I don’t think that’s how we’re gonna build our, our roster,” Heupel said. But, you know, where we were at 65 scholarships as we started kind of patching our roster, it was important that we, we hit on guys that could come in and make an impact on our football team. At the same time, you, you gotta bring in the right culture kids. Otherwise, the things that you’re talking about with your incoming young guys, the things that you’re talking about with the guys that have been here, they kind of look at you side eyed and, go well, you’re talking about these things, but you’re not living them out based on who you’re bringing in.

“We’ve been really fortunate. ’cause I think that’s the hardest thing to find out in the transfer portal. You typically have video of a guy. You’ve seen them perform at a pretty high level at the collegiate level, but you don’t know who they are, what they’re about. And we’ve been really fortunate, the guys that we’ve brought in here the last couple of years, they fit the mold of what Tennessee football stands for and some of those guys have come in in a short amount of time and really thrust themselves into being impact players. And we’ll see that through the course of the season, but more importantly been impactful in the locker room and they live out the right traits.”

Last Year you had a quarterback who was 25 years old and the maturity stood out. This year, you’ve got a linebacker who’s 25 years old. When you got Keenan Pili, what did you think you had and what have you found out that you have?

“I thought we got a guy that was gonna be, the consummate pro that was gonna work in a relentless way for him to be his best,” Heupel said. “That was gonna be strong physical and be a guy that could play really well inside of the box that had played football at a high level and would be able to transition really quickly. And we’ve gotten all that. But what we’ve gotten is a guy that has leadership traits that inspires and connects with his teammates that’s making an impact across our football team, in particular, on the defense side of the ball, we’ve gotten a guy that’s more athletic and has better movement skills than what we anticipated.

“That’s because of Keenan, that’s because of our strength staff nutrition. He’s grown in a really good way all off season.”

I’ve Always wondered this, you’re the head coach of the whole team, but ultimately you still are the offensive guy calling plays. So when you’re in practice and the defense makes a play, how much do you have to juggle being the head coach who’s like, yeah, that’s a great, great development versus man they got us on that one?

“I try to be the first guy over to celebrate with the defense every time they create a turnover every time they make a big play,” Heupel said. “I think it’s really important for us to be the team that we need to be. We gotta be a lead on that side of the football. We gotta be great on special teams and on offense. But I ride with those guys during practice, have a lot of fun competing all phases together. And I think it’s important that they see that, I’m in it with him.”

Joe seems like he has just matured a ton since he got here. He’s always had the laid back demeanor, but just his answers and how thorough, where do you see the biggest difference between Joe who walked in here in May of 2021 and Joe now here in 2023?

“His growth and being able to handle adversity, be able to handle success, being able to refocus and, and control the now,” Heupel said. “He’s a different player than he was, you know, when we first got here, but he’s a different person too, and that’s parlayed himself into him playing in a different way. He’s got really good command of what we’re doing, his grasp of our offense, but also defensive structure and responsibilities from the day he’s gotten here to where he is now, so dramatically different. You know, I’m excited about this journey with him this, this fall.”

You’ve got a lot of upperclassmen on this team. Do you feel like the leadership just kind of runs through that group?

“Championship seasons happen because you got championship leadership inside the locker room,” Heupel said. “At the end of the day, it’s gotta come from within. Um, I gotta help it, you know what I mean? I gotta steer that part of it, but it’s gotta come from within. This is probably as deep of a leadership group as as that we’ve had here at Tennessee, and that’s old guys, but there’s some young guys that are really impactful too, that are a part of that process. So you know, I love what we’ve done. Now you get into the season, it’s important that those guys stay true.

“If stay consistent, the peaks, the valleys, the ups and downs that happened during the season, these guys gotta live it right, When it’s perfect and, and when it’s not perfect.”

Virginia’s not played a game since they had that tragic incident up there with the school shooting where they lost multiple players. Do you talk to your team about what those kids that they’re gonna be playing against have went through the last year?

“Yeah, I think it’s always important to frame, you know, the perspective of, of where your opponent’s potentially coming from,” Heupel said. “We’re gonna recognize what happened there in a unique way. And so I wanted make sure that the team was aware of that too, at the same time. It’s about us when once the ball’s kicked off and, and make sure that we’re of the right mindset.”

Looking at your coaching career, what’s the greatest advice you’ve ever been given and who gave it to you?

“I’ve had a lot of advice from a lot of different people,” Heupel said. “I think one of the most important things that I’ve learned but also was told is at the end of the day you have to be you. If you’re anything other than your true identity and true self players are gonna see through that and, not respond to you the the way that you need too.”

For you to have another big year, what are the keys in your mind?

“Yeah, I wish there was just one or two keys to to make that happen,” Heupel said. At the end of the day, the, the traits that we’ve built gotta move forward with us. Sure that becomes harder as you get into the season because everybody’s not gonna live in the exact role of what they personally wanted during the course of a game or during the course of a season. This is a team that is all about the people around you and everybody’s gotta sacrifice something for us to maximize what we want to do as a football team. So I think that’s gonna be really important that this team stays true to the team throughout the course of the season.

Defensively, there’s steps that we gotta take in, in third and long defense. Offensively, we gotta be great upfront and be able to control the line of scrimmage and we gotta be great decision makers with the ball. There’s so many things that play into it. Special teams has to be the difference in the football game for us. And, you know, part of why we read the maximums every week is because those things hold true and they speak to all three phases of the game.”

Lastly, when you look at, at how far this place has come in just a short amount of time, what are you most proud of?

“I’m proud of the culture, the connection that this program has built and lives out every single day,” Heupel said. “That’s our coaches, that’s our players. It’s strength, it’s medical, it’s nutrition, the energy that’s been created. Our ability to love competing with each other every day while we’re out on the practice field or in the weight room and how we approach going and competing against a another opponent has been hard to build. It’s also been one of the most fun things about being here. I love what this team represents right now.”

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