Rapid Reaction: Tennessee falls to Illinois on walk-off field goal in Music City Bowl
By Andrew Olson
Published:
Tennessee’s 2025 season ends with a disappointing loss to Illinois in the Music City Bowl. The Illini walked it off, kicking a game-winning field goal on the final play of the game to secure a 30-28 victory over the Vols. Bret Bielema’s team finishes the year 9-4, while Josh Heupel’s squad went 8-5.
The big story of the night was how Illinois effectively limited the high-powered Tennessee passing attack, which was missing SEC-leading wide receiver Chris Brazzell II (62 catches, 1,017 yards, 9 touchdowns).
Joey Aguilar came into the game averaging 287 passing yards per game at a clip of 32.2 attempts per game for just under 9 yards per attempt. Aguilar completed 14-of-18 passes, but the big plays weren’t there on Tuesday night, as the Vols gained only 121 yards through the air.
Tuesday’s effort meant Aguilar finished the 2025 season with 3,565 passing yards, good for No.3 on Tennessee’s all-time single-season passing yards list, ahead of Erik Ainge.
The Vols had better luck on the ground, rushing for 157 yards. DeSean Bishop accounted for 93 of those yards. He finished the season with 1,076 yards, adding his name to Tennessee’s list of 1,000-yard rushers.
It’s the 3rd time in program history — and first since 2007 — that Tennessee had a 3,000-yard passer, 1,000-yard rusher and 1,000-yard receiver in the same season.
The Illini out-gained the Vols 417 total yards of offense to 278. Veteran Illinois quarterback Luke Altmyer, an Ole Miss transfer, completed 61% of his passes for 196 yards and 1 touchdown. He also contributed to Illinois’ 221 rushing yards with 54 of his own, including 1 score on the ground.
Tennessee was aided by a big special teams play. After Illinois took a 27-21 lead, Joakim Dodson responded with a 94-yard kickoff return for a touchdown that gave Tennessee a 28-27 lead with 4:58 to go. The Vols, though, were unable to get a stop as Illinois drove 64 yards on 13 plays to kick the 29-yard field goal.
Illinois 30, Tennessee 28
Here’s the Music City Bowl box score (use the dropdown menu to select team or player stats), followed by the complete play-by-play:
Andrew writes about sports to fund his love of live music and collection of concert posters. He strongly endorses the Hall of Fame campaigns of Fred Taylor and Andruw Jones.
