Josh Heupel’s team blew it against Georgia, but as painful as it was, Tennessee is proving people wrong
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I don’t have any answers for Tennessee.
As Max Gilbert lined up for what appeared to be a comfortable 43-yard field goal attempt to win it at the end of regulation, I assumed that the Vols were finally about to end the Georgia losing streak at 8. The college football world would then spend all of Saturday night and next week patting Josh Heupel on the back for doing what felt impossible a few short months ago. That is, watching Joey Aguilar be the one to find the answers to Kirby Smart‘s defense.
And as history has shown us in this rivalry, assumptions make little sense.
One missed field goal and 1 overtime later, Tennessee was again back in familiar territory — searching for answers after another Georgia loss. That 44-41 overtime loss will sting, and understandably so. After all, the Vols finally found answers after the 1st quarter against Georgia (more on that in a minute). They fought. They got the striped capacity crowd rocking at key moments. They did just about everything but make a kick.
Well, the false start before the missed 43-yard field goal didn’t help, but that’s a different discussion.
Lost in shuffle of that game will be what Tennessee showed. The Vols proved people wrong
That includes me, who speculated as recently as August about whether Aguilar would be overwhelmed by UGA in Week 3 and if the post-spring transfer from UCLA/Nico Iamaleava replacement would ultimately give way to Jake Merklinger.
Nope. Aguilar was a shanked kick away from doing what Iamaleava, Joe Milton, Hendon Hooker, Jarrett Guarantano and Brian Maurer couldn’t do. But Saturday wasn’t about doing what previous Tennessee quarterbacks couldn’t do. That includes Iamaleava.
Plus, let’s be honest. The “who won the breakup” discussion ended on Friday night in front of a smattering of UCLA fans as the Bruins were walloped by New Mexico.
Saturday was about Aguilar playing like the fearless, on-borrowed-time quarterback he’s been since arriving in Knoxville. While he wasn’t perfect, starting 14-for-14 with a 21-point 1st quarter on that stage showed that moment wasn’t too big for him. Of course, he was hardly the first Heupel quarterback to start fast against the Dawgs. All 4 of his meetings against UGA began with an opening-score drive and an early Tennessee lead.
What was going to define Aguilar’s performance was how he responded to the inevitable lull that Smart’s teams always delivered to the Tennessee offense, which had been outscored 106-20 in quarters 2-4 during the Heupel era.
It took nearly 2 full quarters and nearly 2 hours of real time to shake out of that inevitable offensive rut — which saw UGA score 20 consecutive points — but Aguilar delivered in the biggest way with a go-ahead touchdown:
That’s been the welcome sight for Tennessee through 2 weeks. The explosive passing plays that were lacking with Iamaleava and Milton haven’t been hard to come by with Aguilar. Entering the day, he was 5-for-8 on throws that were 20 yards past the line of scrimmage. Aguilar had 3 touchdown passes of 30 yards alone en route to his 371-yard, 5-touchdown (4 passing, 1 rushing) performance.
Remember, this was a fall camp that started with Tennessee practicing at times with a receiver room that didn’t have a single guy who played in a game for the Vols last year. To say that there were questions about that group — and really the offense as a whole — would be a wild understatement.
Through 3 weeks and 1 41-point performance against a UGA defense, can we say that question has been answered?
No, that doesn’t magically take the pain away from loss No. 9 to Smart and Co. Nobody should walk away from Saturday’s game feeling like Heupel conquered the last beast because the scoreboard is the only thing that matters.
But once that pain settles a bit and reality sinks in, Tennessee fans will realize that they’ve got a team that’s plenty capable of making another Playoff push. Soon, Jermod McCoy and Rickey Gibson will be back to help a secondary that allowed Gunner Stockton to throw for a career-high 304 yards and 2 touchdowns, none of which were bigger than this one on 4th down.
Again, I don’t have answers for how one defends that. That’s an exceptional throw and catch on every level. Sometimes, you tip your cap. Other times, you forget to cover Zachariah Branch on a game-tying 2-point conversion and you realize why you can’t have nice things.
Sorry, Tennessee fans. You didn’t deserve that.
You didn’t deserve the way that things played out on Saturday night. That was torture. Even watching Josh McCray muscle his way into the end zone and needing a booth review to overturn the initial spot was torture.
But amidst that Georgia torture under Heupel is a silver lining that persists. It’s a continued sense that as long as Smart isn’t the one on the other sideline, nobody is getting out of Neyland Stadium alive. The program is in its best 3-year stretch in 2 decades, and early signs suggest that’ll turn into a 4-year stretch.
Call that “loser behavior” if you want, or call it an observation from someone who watched this program without an ability to empathize with Tennessee fans, but saw questions answered in a bunch of ways against Georgia.
Time will tell if Week 3 will be the difference in making the Playoff. If Heupel plays his cards as well as he has during his time in Knoxville, it could be the moment in which Tennessee realized that it can play with anyone. It was fair to question that about the new-look Vols entering 2025.
Nobody should dismiss Aguilar and the Vols. Anybody who did that has already been proven wrong.
Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Down South. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.
