DG's Thoughts after Week 4

[DiderotsGhost]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

 

[Rickyvol77]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

Great post

 

[TnVol!]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

Good post and Danielson is the worst.

 

[PEPPERJAX]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

Boom playa!

 

[Hexad Vol]

Agree completely about the running out the clock strategy. Take all the time you want between plays, but run your regular play selection with a preference for high completion percentage passes.

 

[Samthebam]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

Think that you’ve touched on something here.
I’ve also noticed that Heupel’s teams seem to have a pattern of getting stupid penalties at times; but you also touched on his coaching style being more like Pete Carroll than Nick Saban.

There’s probably a bit of a causal relationship between the two, but another benefit of Heupel’s style is that his teams don’t seem to play tight. In previous years, we likely lose that game last night at the end.

 

[zaqhhh]

Has the secondary/D Coordinator addressed why it is so bad and they can't seem to improve it? If they can't get it right by season end, someone needs to be gone over that.

UF had more pass yards against us than against USF, Utah, and UK combined

 

[VolFaninFla]

Love your post DG.
Thank you for sharing.

 

[vols2345]

Has the secondary/D Coordinator addressed why it is so bad and they can't seem to improve it? If they can't get it right by season end, someone needs to be gone over that.

UF had more pass yards against us than against USF, Utah, and UK combined

to be fair they didnt have to play the way on offense they did yesterday vs those other teams. UT's offense put pressure on florida to play that way before even stepping on the field

 

[zaqhhh]

to be fair they didnt have to play the way on offense they did yesterday vs those other teams. UT's offense put pressure on florida to play that way before even stepping on the field

That is a fair observation, but there is absolutely no legitimate excuse for the secondary performance we saw yesterday

 

[The Original Fade]

Agree completely about the running out the clock strategy. Take all the time you want between plays, but run your regular play selection with a preference for high completion percentage passes.

100% agree

 

[supersmo18]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

Gary Danielson is a hot turd

 

[Real Info]

to be fair they didnt have to play the way on offense they did yesterday vs those other teams. UT's offense put pressure on florida to play that way before even stepping on the field

This is what I love about our offense, but you’re right, opponents offense will use four downs instead of three to move the chains. Better odds of getting the first down.

 

[THEONLYTENISEE]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

In the 2 years under Heupel, whose defense gave us the most challenge?

 

[vols2345]

This is what I love about our offense, but you’re right, opponents offense will use four downs instead of three to move the chains. Better odds of getting the first down.

They have too. Never seen any offense make opponents call games the way ours does. Its like coaches watch film and concede they got nothing for it!

 

[Jauan't Some?]

Great post as always DG, hope to see you around here more.

 

[THEONLYTENISEE]

I’m not sure Auburn can give LSU a 4 quarter game. Auburn has major issues on offense. I did see were LSU’s quarterback was injured.

 

[Winchester73]

Good post. I think everyone should go back and watch the highlights … just the highlights. AR and the receivers played the game of their lives. Maybe UK is a little better than we gave them credit ? Maybe Fl was overlooking USF and thinking about us? Last year we got them at their best also. Most of that will be proven true or not very soon. I don’t think our guys were as ready to play SEC defense as they will be. This game was their first SEC test and I think they will get better and learned some things.

 

[MRobVFL]

Good post. I think everyone should go back and watch the highlights … just the highlights. AR and the receivers played the game of their lives. Maybe UK is a little better than we gave them credit ? Maybe Fl was overlooking USF and thinking about us? Last year we got them at their best also. Most of that will be proven true or not very soon. I don’t think our guys were as ready to play SEC defense as they will be. This game was their first SEC test and I think they will get better and learned some things.

Last night I didn't feel as jubilant as I should've after beating Florida. I was pretty down on the way the defense played and the way the game was managed at the end. After sleeping on it and giving it some thought I realized that we took on Florida at their absolute best, as it always seems we do. We also took on Florida at perhaps our worst and we still walked out with the win. I'm proud of that.

We usually have to play a perfect game to stay in it with Florida... instead, yesterday Florida had to play their best game to stay in it with us. Last night we played sloppy with penalties and horrid on defense and won. We flipped the script on them and had we played played a perfect game with Tilman and Sampson available I think we would have absolutely boat raced them. Hopefully we get things cleaned up and are able to go into the next stretch reaching the full potential of this team.

 

[vols2345]

Last night I didn't feel as jubilant as I should've after beating Florida. I was pretty down on the way the defense played and the way the game was managed at the end. After sleeping on it and giving it some thought I realized that we took on Florida at their absolute best, as it always seems we do. We also took on Florida at perhaps our worst and we still walked out with the win. I'm proud of that.

We usually have to play a perfect game to stay in it with Florida... instead, yesterday Florida had to play their best game to stay in it with us. Last night we played sloppy with penalties and horrid on defense and won. We flipped the script on them and had we played played a perfect game with Tilman and Sampson available I think we would have absolutely boat raced them. Hopefully we get things cleaned up and are able to go into the next stretch reaching the full potential of this team.

Was begging the fellow vol fans to just enjoy the win. No one is going to remember the defensive performance this off season. We will remember no mattered how hard they tried they just couldn't beat us.

 

[jim pique]

You must remember,Gary,the poor soul,played for Purdue when they were two yards and a glop of mud.Then he took his otherworldliness to Detroit for seven unglorious years.He can talk and suck ass at the same time,that's is why .The little ten(12) will welcome him with open sliders next year.

 

[Winchester73]

Was begging the fellow vol fans to just enjoy the win. No one is going to remember the defensive performance this off season. We will remember no mattered how hard they tried they just couldn't beat us.

It’s unreal what some of these kids are able to do with the football. I remember watching game highlights from the 80s and if a team was ahead by more than a FG with 2-3 minutes left they usually won. Point is, we’re going to see more and more games like this. Playing and executing defense is more difficult each year.

 

[vols2345]

It’s unreal what some of these kids are able to do with the football. I remember watching game highlights from the 80s and if a team was ahead by more than a FG with 2-3 minutes left they usually won. Point is, we’re going to see more and more games like this. Playing and executing defense is more difficult each year.

Nfl been this way too. Football is being played at a crazy high level mentally!

 

[Schasz]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

Very good points made! I agree 100% that 2 pivotal games are as you mentioned the LSU road game and KY home game. Win those games and UT should finish 10-2 barring injuries. While it would be nice to also win either BAMA or UGA games I just don't see that happening this season. We'll take that step once we have few more elite athletes on the defensive side.

 

[SmokinBob]

Life has been good, but very busy lately, so I won't have many detailed write-ups this year.

That said think I may have lost 10 years off my life last night, but at least we won! My thoughts on Florida and our Vols after 4 games:


Heupel knows offense. We've seen it since early last season, but nothing has changed my mind. Heupel is an offensive guru on the level of a Steve Spurrier or Mike Leach. Most of our issues on offense have been execution related (dropped passes, overthrown balls, etc), but I'm 99%+ satisfied with what Heupel is doing on offense.

D-line looks good. They don't have a lot of sacks to their name, but they have dramatically altered games with the pass rush this season. They've been better than expected.

Deepest WR Corps in long time. I'm not saying this is an all-time unit, but it could eventually be in the conversation. Tillman, Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, Merrill, Squirrel White, Holliday. To have your #1 WR go out in a key game and still put up 350 yards passing is pretty insane. Not to mention, Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant, our TEs, have also been picking up some yardage as well.

Team is happy. This is just the happiest I've seen our guys in a long time. Seems like they are having fun. This isn't the Nick Saban school of football. Heupel is more of a Pete Carroll type of coach and it's working.

Milton looks better. He didn't play last night, but I've been very impressed with Milton so far. Remember, I was one of his biggest critics last season and I still trust Hooker much more, but I could see Milton winning the starting job next year and doing pretty well.

Hooker is a gamer. He's not been perfect. He's had some overthrows here and there, makes a few mistakes, but reminds me a lot of Josh Dobbs. He's a gamer. When the game is on the line, he comes through. He makes the right decisions. 349 yards passing, 112 rushing.

Jabari Small. Quietly put up 90 yards on 17 carries. Very good performance that got overlooked a bit.

Secondary was awful. I have a lot of great things to say about the team, but the secondary has not been good this year. Gave up 453 yards against a mediocre QB last night, Struggled mightily against Pitt. Too many coverage busts. Wide open receivers. Generally feel like the defense is playing better, but secondary is struggling a lot. Don't think we can be an elite team with the problems on pass defense and we still haven't faced an A-level passing attack.

Hate the "run out the clock sequence" by Heupel. This is a constant criticism from me not only of Heupel, but a lot of coaches ... stop trying to win the game on defense when your offense is clobbering the other team. Florida had 2 timeouts. They had plenty of time to score. So don't do 3 predictable runs. Just play normal. Run the clock when you can, but continue putting pressure in the passing game. It's particularly effective when they are crowding the line to stop the run. Win the game on offense. They couldn't stop us, so why gamble with giving them the ball back. Just play for 1st downs until you can run it out.

Too many penalties. We didn't make nearly as many mistakes yesterday as we did against Pitt, but still picking up too many penalties. Seems like a consistent theme on Heupel's team, but would like to see it improve. Get rid of unnecessary penalties and this offense is even more unstoppable. And feel like when the offense doesn't work, it's normally us "stopping ourselves" more so than the defense.

LSU is going to be tough. Having an off-week will be great and we're going to need it. This LSU game, along with the Kentucky game, are IMO the 2 most pivotal games remaining on the schedule. Both are winnable, but neither will be easy. Feel like we know nothing about LSU right now. They struggled Week 1, but that's not uncommon. They clobbered Miss State. Other 2 games were cupcakes. We'll see how they handle Auburn this weekend. Feels a lot like that Texas A&M game in 2016 to me though.

Gary Danielson is the worst. Ugh, I never get as mad listening to other announcers as I do with Danielson. He's awful; absolute worst. Not only does his Florida homer-ism shine through the entire game, but he's the least knowledgeable announcer on the planet. Constantly misunderstands plays. Yesterday, when Florida was offsides and our Center hiked it and Hooker wasn't ready, he went on-and-on about how Tennessee got lucky that Florida was offsides. NO WE DIDN'T!!! The Center is coached to hike in that situation; Hooker just didn't expect it. The Center doesn't hike the ball there if the Florida player isn't offsides. Danielson somehow doesn't know that. But that's just one example. His lack of knowledge comes through the entire game.

We beat Florida! At the end of the day, we beat the Gators. Not as cleanly as I would've liked it to be, but we got the W. They always give us their best and yesterday was no exception, but we survived!


That's all for now. Enjoying everyone else's write-ups lately, but thought I'd pump a quick one out this week. Let's enjoy the stress-free bye week before our trip to Baton Rouge!

GBO!

Enjoy your thoughts after the games!