An important fact about me: I’ve been a die-hard Vol fan for my entire life. In 35 years, I’ve known nothing for a longer amount of time than “God loves you, and we love the Tennessee Volunteers”. It was instilled into me from Day One by my orange-blooded father.
Many of my core childhood memories are anchored by something to do with the Vols, one of these days I’ll write more about them. My dad made sure I was there for all the moments from the mid-90s to early 2000s. Peyton Manning to Tee Martin. SEC and National Championships. Beating Alabama 10 time out of my first 12 games including a 5 OT psycho-fest in 2003. Florida in The Swamp in 2001. Getting Florida again with a kick that could’ve shocked my heart into rhythm in 2004. The comeback against LSU in ’05. The slaughter of California in ’06. Just to name a few.
He also made sure I was there for the heartbreakers like the 1997 Orange Bowl where I saw my dad have an honest-to-god mental breakdown for the first time in my life. The Jabar Gaffney “catch” that for a brief period of time converted us from decent, God-fearing people to abhorrent creatures seeking destruction. The 2001 SEC Championship disaster – a wound that will never fully heal. The 2005 loss the Vanderbilt when I thought things could never get any worse (I was wrong).
In my pre-teen years, my dad and I become known in some circles as Big Orange and Little Orange. When my little brother was old enough, he fit right in and made it an orange trio.
All this to say, coming together to pull for the Tennessee Volunteers is part of who we are as a family. It’s in our DNA. The absolute BEST memories, the cream of the crop, come from Tennessee game day experiences. Some of the worst ones come from this too. But even the worst memories are fun and good to look back on when you share them with a family who cares about it as much as you do.
My brother and I are grown now, married, and live in different states. The three of us don’t get to go through full football seasons every year like we used to. But each year, we make the time to make it happen. Because it’s important.
In 2021 we started a new annual tradition called The Parker-Cast. Inspired by ESPN’s Manning-Cast, this is where we pick a game or two per season and watch together over a video conference call and commentate on it Manning style. It’s been a huge hit with our family and something that we’ll continue on as a long term tradition.
In 2022 we all got tickets to the Kentucky game in Knoxville where we converged and had the best time watching one of the most enjoyable beatdowns of the Wildcats the Vols have had in a long time.
This year, we decided to do a true throwback. My brother and I made our way home to East Tennessee for the weekend and watched the game in our childhood home with Dad. If memory serves correctly, this is the first time we all three have been able to physically watch together at HOME since… 2016 (??), which was the season before I moved to Texas.
To say we picked a good weekend for this is an understatement. Saturday was a day that I’ll remember for a long time. We spent the morning at the family farm, we went through the gauntlet of Big Orange emotions throughout the game, we had some home cooking and ate a few staples of childhood football season in East Tennessee, and we only had to stop someone from bleeding once.
Add another one to the history books of Parker Boys Tennessee Football. Here’s to hoping there are many more to come.
Now let’s try to parse out what the heck actually happened on Saturday.
September 27, 2025 – Starkville, MS. That was weird. But it was also okay? But it was also bad. But it was also gritty? It was not what I expected. But it was also exactly what I expected. Do that exercise for about 47 more minutes and you’ll be right around where I was in the wee hours of Sunday morning trying to scramble some notes together for this column.
If you were watching the Tennessee Volunteers for the first time last weekend, congratulations! You just got the full Tennessee experience in one sitting. The “No, no, no, yes” theory on full display in all its glory. So what exactly happened? How are any of us supposed to feel after a game like that? That’s what I’m hoping to make sense of today.
Let’s start by making a few things clear. Tennessee is a good team that’s going to see more success this year, but so is Mississippi State. MSU is well-coached, is clearly improved in every facet from last year, and had a great game-plan in place to make things hard on Tennessee. The Vols had many self inflicted errors on Saturday that could have swung the game in a dramatically different direction, but upon rewatch, the MSU plan was cleverly designed to put Tennessee in positions to make those mistakes.
The good news? Tennessee is not a one-dimensional team. You can’t take one thing away from the Vols and expect them to fall apart like, say, the 2021 team. MSU Head Coach Jeff Lebby is a former Heupel Offensive Coordinator and knows that the number one goal of any Heupel offense is to establish the run. So Lebby (smartly) spent the entire game bent on stopping the run from happening and forcing Aguilar and the receivers to beat them. Lebby dared us to throw and banked on us making enough mistakes to give MSU a chance. Offensively, MSU wanted to run the ball themselves, have long sustained drives, and keep Tennessee’s explosive offense on the bench for minimum opportunities.
And it nearly worked!
The Vols running game never did get rolling and the offense was consistently off-schedule. Tennessee messed up two punts, dropped open touchdowns, committed penalties (some fair, some not), saw passed bounce off hands for turnovers, and MSU led by a touchdown with only minutes to play.
But this Tennessee team showed that they have some resilience. They can beat you in multiple ways. Joey Aguilar shook off all the unfortunate events that had happened over the course of the game, pulled up his bootstraps and went to work to the tune of 6/6 on what could easily be a season-defining drive to tie the game and send it to overtime where the Vols would finally take the win.
Think about the players who came through on the final possessions of this game:
- Joey Aguilar – shook off turnovers and drops to orchestrate a 6/6 season-saving drive.
- Braylon Staley – had the worst game of his career with drops and turnovers, came up with the biggest catch and effort to get a first down when it was score or go home.
- DeSean Bishop – bottled up all day, had few opportunities in the game, makes the most of his opportunity in overtime with a one-play punch to the gut that sucked the life out of the Bulldogs.
- David Sanders – thrown into action for the first time all season as a true freshman, shows that he belongs on the field in the biggest moment and shakes off a false start that could have been costly.
- Arion Carter – has been getting moved all over the field with MSU eye candy and was dared by MSU to beat their rushing attack, responded with 17 tackles and the game-winning pass breakup in overtime.
That’s resiliency. That’s a group of guys who faced adversity from opening kickoff to the final five minutes and then clutched up, turned it on, and made it happen.
So how did we even get here? This was one of the weirdest games I can think of in recent memory. Tennessee made mistake after mistake, but at the same time, made play after play to make up for those mistakes. Eventually, the good balanced out the bad until Tennessee’s talent had a chance to put it away. Let’s approach this by looking at the Good, the Bad, and the Weird.
The Good
Interceptions aside, Joey Aguilar had one of the most productive days a Tennessee QB has had in years and he was a couple of drops and an inexcusable OPI call from having one of the best days in Tennessee history. Aguilar is cool as a cucumber. Nothing rattles him or shakes his confidence. Everything that could have gone wrong for the offense went wrong. When the 4th quarter started, the defense had more touchdowns than the offense. But Aguilar believes in himself and believes in the system. Nothing was going to deter him from putting together the drive to save the season down 7 with only 5 minutes remaining.
The play that exemplifies Joey Aguilar to me was at the 40 yard line with 3:59 remaining, Aguilar drops back, has both feet wrapped up by defenders, and still manages to make a perfect throw to Mike Matthews while falling nearly perpendicular to the ground. It was a play reminiscent of prime Ben Roethlisberger and it happened in the biggest moment.
Chris Brazzell continued marching on his Biletnikoff campaign by looking like an uncoverable receiver. He was running crisp routes, flying by defenders. He caught jump balls. He made one of the clutch catches of the game by double clutching a pass over the middle to convert a 4th down. He made this catch below while contorting his body in a way that will have NFL scouts tripping over themselves to tell their GMs to draft this guy.
Brazzell has become not only the most dynamic receive in Tennessee’s receiving room but maybe the entire country. His growth has been nothing short of jaw-dropping. Health permitting, every Tennessee receiving record you can think of could be in jeopardy this season. That means something coming from a school that considers itself Wide Receiver U.
Tennessee’s running game was bottled up most of the game by Tennessee standards. The struggle was by MSU design, but Tennessee still ran for a total of 131 yards and made plays when it mattered. When push literally came to shove, Heupel had the perfect play up his sleeve – one that he may have borrowed from Georgia just 2 weeks ago – and DeSean Bishop along with some key blockers made it happen.
There’s no reason to panic about the run game. MSU sold out to stop it and still only marginally stopped it.
The defense likely had the weirdest game of the day. The defense had their share of mistakes and struggled to contain the edge in the run game. But other than that? When I rewatched the game I came away thinking that the defense was really close to having a spectacular game.
In the moment, it felt like Tennessee was getting gashed in the run game, almost at will. But when you look at the stats, MSU had 198 rushing yards on 57 carries. That’s a grand total of 3.5 yards per carry. That’s not the type of day on the ground MSU actually wanted. As good as Fluff Bothwell played (averaging over 5 yards per carry himself), he couldn’t carry the entire day and everyone else who got carries was effectively stuffed (including Booth who I thought played much better than he actually did).
The defensive line struggled at times to contain the edge because they get so wrapped up in rushing the passer. But they are GREAT at rushing the passer. Every time Blake Shapen was asked to run a play that required anything other than a single, instant read, the pocket collapsed almost immediately. The pass rushing prowess of the defensive line caused two defensive scores that were instrumental in pulling out the win.
The Bad
So why did the defensive performance feel so much worse in the moment than it actually was? I believe the main reason is that the offensive mistakes put the defense in impossible situations multiple times. Tennessee turnovers resulted in the MSU offense scoring 21 points from drive of 20 yards, 26 yards, and 17 yards. That’s a total of 63 yards for 21 points. That means 61% of MSU’s points for the entire game came from a total of 63 yards.
It’s a miracle Tennessee even had a chance to win this game at all. simply put, these mistakes can’t happen against the upper tier teams remaining on the schedule. The drops must be cleaned up. The penalties must be cut down. The tackling and keeping contain must be tightened up.
Defensively, I need to see the edge rushers not overshoot when the ball is handed off. The linebackers were run ragged on Saturday due to running backs getting into the second level.
Safety Andre Turrentine continues to be a bit of a net zero for me. He takes bad angles and doesn’t have the raw athleticism to make up for it.
The linebackers Carter, Telander, and Spillman are very good, but they still remind you that they’re young and still getting experience. I would like to see a little jump in their grown coming out of the bye.
Offensively, Miles Kitselman has work to do and we’ll talk about that a little more in 10 Things.
Braylen Staley had the worst game of his career on Saturday. A muffed punt begat another bad punt that he allowed to bounce to the one yard line. That begat several drops throughout the game, finishing with only 4 catches on 10 targets. Fortunately, Staley was able to stay resilient, shake it off, and came up with one of the biggest plays of the game, catching a third down pass short of the line to gain, turned up field, and refused to go down until the first down was made. I can’t help but think that this type of mindset trickles down from his QB.
And the final Bad, the end of game clock management. Look, I GET trying to make sure that MSU didn’t have time to get a field goal themselves. I GET not wanting your team to make a mistake that could cost you the game. But it felt like Heupel just wasn’t exactly sure what he wanted to do for whatever reason.
This isn’t the first time that we’ve seen Heupel rely on his tempo in end of game situations rather than use timeouts. But Heupel’s stubbornness to keep saying “just ONE MORE PLAY then I’ll call timeout” is the definition of playing with fire. With the time that we had, with all three timeouts remaining, and the offense that we run, there was simply no excuse for not giving Max Gilbert an opportunity to win this game in regulation. And thinking bigger picture, how good of an opportunity would it have been for Gilbert to get another shot to win a game? We’re going to need Gilbert again in a tight spot at some point this season. I would have loved for the sake of his confidence to set him up for success and see him win this game. Now he’ll have to continue to wait for his number to be called in a big situation again. And the longer that simmers, the more nervous I’ll be.
Heupel is blessed beyond measure that this game resulted in a win. Had we lost, it would have been nearly impossible to not look back on that final sequence of regulation as a huge coaching mistake. Fair or not, it would have caused some seat warming for Heupel’s tenure, and that’s not something that I want or am in any way prepared to deal with.
The Weird
The weirdest thing about this game was just the YES-NO-YES-NO-YES rollercoaster that started on the very first possession and didn’t stop until the game-winning pass breakup in overtime.
A three-and-out led to a fumbled punt and MSU score which led to a pick 6 for us which led to more Tennessee turnovers for MSU points which led to a sack fumble returned for a touchdown which led to an MSU game controlling drive which led to a clutch drive by Aguilar to tie it which led to a one-play overtime score which led to an overtime stop for the win. Got that?
The sequence that summarized the entire game was MSU converting the fake punt which in the moment seemed like they were taking final control of the game. As immediate as the fake punt happened, Tyre West annihilated Blake Shapen leading to a Josh Jospehs touchdown. A play that was so stunning and so far out of left field that my dad, brother, and myself weren’t even sure that it actually happened. Each of us waiting for a flag or thinking the ball was down or thinking that we imagined the whole thing. It was real, and it was another example of a game that had officially left the reservation.
10 Things I Think I Know
1. I think the bye week needs to be about cleanup, not panic.
It was easy for all of us to come away from that game feeling a bit “holy-moly we may not be as good as we thought we were” and you would be totally justified feeling that way for a few hours. But after sleeping it off, stepping back, and looking at this objectively, we’re pretty okay.
Aside from a major injury, literally everything went wrong in this game and Tennessee did what good teams do: find a way to survive and win regardless.
The bye week couldn’t come at a better time and bye weeks are much more fun and useful when you’re coming off a big win. Offense, clean up the drops. Defense, clean up containing the edge. Someone check on Max Gilbert now and then. Otherwise, keep doing what your doing and get ready to punch Arkansas in the mouth.
2. I think that nobody will work harder than Miles Kitselman to fix those dropped passes.
Speaking of dropped passes, senior tight end and notable team captain, Miles Kitselman had two of them. And both resulted in interceptions. Much like Heupel’s clock management at the end of the game, Miles is lucky that those picks didn’t cost Tennessee the win. For all of Kitselman’s leadership capabilities, he’s had a bit of a shaky start to the season. Miles is one of the most important pieces of this offense but his production has been very up and down. This isn’t the first game this year that he’s been bitten by the drop bug.
But the thing about sports is that leadership is earned. Nobody gets the locker room status that Miles has on this team without being a maniac in the workout room and on the practice field. If someone else were having similar struggles, I’d likely be lobbying for them to see the bench for a game or two. But when it comes to Kitselman, I have zero doubt that he’s gonna spend his entire bye week with the jugs machine working tirelessly to make sure that these drops go the way of the dinosaur (extinct).
Look for Miles Kitselman to come out firing on all cylinders against Arkansas and have his best game as a Volunteer. I’m calling it now.
3. I think that trying to do a “white out” game against Tennessee is a terrible idea.
MSU really thought they were clever to schedule a “white out” game against the Vols. They knew this had trap game potential so they saw fit to pull out all the stops for any advantage possible. The problem is that nobody – I mean NOBODY – travels in college football like Tennessee Vols fans.
Asking everyone in your stadium to where white was the football equivalent of throwing chum into shark infested waters. Vol fans were going to turn out in droves anyway, but against all that white you could spot the orange from a mile away. The “white out” resulted in nearly 1/3 of MSU’s stadium coated in orange which basically became a Neyland wing.
Future opponents take note, “whiting out” your stadium is an excellent way to highlight a Tennessee takeover.
4. I think there is no true SEC frontrunner.
Georgia had a chance to basically lock up half of the SEC with by responding to their survival win over Tennessee with a statement win over an underwhelming Alabama team. The problem is, Georgia seems to be snake-bitten vs the Crimson Tide in a similar way that Tennessee is vs Florida or how Kentucky is vs Tennessee. Georgia was the better team AND they were at home – it mattered not.
Add to that LSU’s somewhat surprising loss to Ole Miss, the slow start by Texas, and Oklahoma’s injured star QB, and the SEC feels as open as it ever has. With a loaded schedule remaining for basically everyone, there’s a real chance that every top SEC team could have multiple losses. Next season starts the SEC’s plan to go to 9 conference games per year and if you’ve seen the upcoming schedule, you know that it’s only going to get harder from here. If there were ever a time for Tennessee to take advantage of a whacky conference, it’s 2025.
5. I think that soup beans and cornbread is an undefeated Southern meal.
I only have the chance to visit home maybe twice a year as long as all goes well. My meal order of choice? My mom’s soup beans and cornbread. Mix those together in a bowl and have a side of pan fried salmon patties or maybe some fried squash, zucchini, and potatoes and you have yourself a meal of perfection. It’s the most Southern of Southern traditions and it transports me back to childhood and teenage years like few other things.
I’ve never found the equivalent in Texas which just reinforces my take that Texas is indeed NOT the South – Texas is just Texas. They really don’t understand here and that’s okay. I’ll continue to make my way to East Tennessee when I need my Southern fix.
The Parker boys take soup beans and cornbread to an even higher level by adding one secret ingredient that takes it over the top into something spiritual. I’m not entirely sure where the tradition came from as I’ve only EVER seen Parker’s or 1st cousins do it. On second thought, I’m not gonna share the secret ingredient with you, I just don’t think you’re ready.
6. I think that top to bottom, that may have been the most entertaining weekend of college football in many years.
The weekend started on Friday night with an insane overtime upset of Virginia over Florida State with the Cavaliers playing the game of their lives. Half of the Top 8 teams in the country lost over the weekend. Tennessee/MSU was like six different games all rolled into one. Illinois walked off a field goal vs USC. Georgia Tech made a big comeback to win in overtime. Ole Miss beat LSU. Indiana found a way to survive. Oregon won a slugfest in overtime vs Penn State. Bama upsets Georgia again. It will be a while before another weekend lives up to that one.
7. I think the refs need to be held responsible for the offensive pass interference call against Chris Brazzell.
Yeah, we’ve gotta talk about it. The SEC has had a ref quality problem for several years now and it’s getting visibly worse. This particular call will linger for a while with me, not only because it wiped out a 59 yard touchdown catch for Chris Brazzell, but because of the level of incompetence it took for that call to go uncorrected. Not only was the play NOT offensive pass interference by every measure of the rule, it wasn’t particularly close or even a “bang-bang” play AND it was called by a ref that wasn’t even privy to the action of the play.
The ref who’s responsibility it was to make (or not make) the call was standing right on top of the play watching and NOT throwing a flag… because there was no interference. Then suddenly a ref wayyyy off in the distance who couldn’t even see the play unfold, decides it’s time to exercise his authority and make a potentially game-changing call. Why his flag didn’t get picked up and overruled by the sideline judge who was watching the play and didn’t make a call is a mystery to me.
But here’s the problem – it will remain a mystery to me because the SEC makes zero effort to enforce accountability for its referees. There will be no useful report. There will be no statement that the refs got it wrong and that they’ll do everything they can to correct these calls in the future. They will act like it never happened and the same refs will be allowed on the field next week to dictate games as they see fit with no fear of consequence.
This isn’t just a problem for Tennessee. You may recall Auburn getting royally screwed by the refs just last week against Oklahoma in a gaff that was so bad, it actually did make the referee committee release a statement. And even that statement was empty and offered no consequence.
It seems that the ACC (for once) may actually be on to something in this area. If you watched Virginia/Florida State on Friday night, you may have seen a broadcast experiment where the ACC allowed the television network to listen in and air the conversation between the refs and the replay booth on all plays that were reviewed. At first I found it annoying, but then I realized that the refs are more incentivized than ever to get the call right. Everything they talked about to come to the conclusion of their call was beamed directly to us, and it was enlightening!
The bottom line here is that if I were making mistake after mistake in my job, I’d have to answer for it one way or another. My solution? It would be for a detailed weekly report each week by each referee crew explaining the logic for each and every flag or review that happened during their game. You know how in the NBA when a player receives their 16th technical foul of the season, they have to serve a one game suspension? Let’s do the same for refs. If their report finds so many missed or incorrect calls in a season, it’s suspension time.
That’s just one idea out of hundreds that the SEC could consider to fix it’s referee problem. It’s inexcusable for a league that makes so much money and is so prominent in American sports that they let this problem fester.
8. I think the David Sanders doubt that’s been circulating online has been ridiculous and peak Vol fan overreaction.
David Sanders finally got on the field last week and boy did it look like he belonged. This should dispel the rumors that have been running rampant that Sanders was holding out, planning to transfer, yada yada, blah blah. Sanders is a young kid that had an unfortunate pre-season injury and it’s clear that he’s been working as hard as possible to get back.
Guess what? Not everything has to be a conspiracy, not everything has to be worse case scenario. Sometimes it’s as simple as not wanting your young, inexperienced, and overly ambitious prized player to hurt himself worse than he already is and set himself back significantly.
Sanders looks fine – potentially great, even. How about let’s stop the weird online chatter about his commitment and get in his corner as a football player.
9. I think it’s important to remember where you came from and to get back to your roots now and then.
I’ve talked a lot about visiting home in this week’s column and for good reason. It can be good for the soul when done right. I think moving away from home can be a good thing. It can help you learn about yourself and grow in ways that you simply can’t when you stay home. I’m not saying leaving home is better or anything… it’s just different and can be rewarding in it’s own way.
An unintended consequence of leaving home is that you learn to appreciate it in new and explosive ways. Take the local East Tennessee fast food restaurant, Pals, for instance. I grew up less than a mile away from a Pals. I could walk or ride a bike there any time I wanted. By the time I was 20, I probably would’ve told you that I didn’t really care for Pals all that much. Not long after I moved away, I realized that Pals wasn’t just fast food, it was a local delicacy. Something that was irreplicable in all other corners of the globe. Suddenly, it was the only thing I wanted – and couldn’t have until I got back home.
And it’s not just the food that’s meaningful when you go home. It’s the family. It’s the old friends that you grew up with. It’s remembering how you used to view life mixed with all the things you’ve learned in the big city that shapes your life now. And it’s realizing that it was never supposed to be one lifestyle vs another, but views that can work together and take care of each other to create a better world.
If you’ve left home for one reason or another, nothing gives you better clarity and perspective like going back, getting in touch with your roots, and using that new perspective to grow. If you’ve never left home, I encourage you to consider branching out in some way shape or form. It doesn’t have to be permanent. It doesn’t even have to be for very long. Just go somewhere that’s not yours. Eat the food. Talk to someone who doesn’t look or sound like you. Then bring what you learn back home. You’ll be surprised at how much the world has in common with you and how easy it is to love other people and try to take care of each other when you just go out and explore it.
At the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about.
10. I think that Tennessee is a really good football team who still has all their goals in front of them.
The Vols are 4-1. They’ve played 2 SEC games and 3 Power 5 teams. Among some struggles, they’ve show flashes of defensive brilliance and offensive explosion. Remember, this team had so many unknowns. Most picked us to lose 3 games, some 4. Tennessee has responded by showing that they belong at the big boys table. We are one made field goal from being 5-0 and likely a Top 5 ranked team – and we haven’t come close to finding the ceiling of this team yet. All facets of this team are trending towards getting better and better. At this point, everything is on the table.
Awards of the Week
Offensive Players of the Week
- Joey Aguilar QB – 335 yards, 1 touchdown, could’ve had 500 yards and 3 touchdowns with some breaks. Overcame adversity and put the team on his back when it mattered.
- Chris Brazzell WR – 6 catches, 105 yards, 1 touchdown. Did lead the team in receiving yards (Matthews) but had 3 of the most impressive catches I’ve seen all season including a double-clutch catch to convert a 4th down that saved the game.
Defensive Players of the Week
- Colton Hood DB – MVP of the first half. 6 tackles, 2 TFLs, 1 pass deflected, 1 pick 6 that saved the game from turning wholly in MSU’s favor.
- Arion Carter MLB – MVP of the second half. MSU dared Arion Carter to beat them by running and throwing over him constantly all game long. Carter wasn’t perfect, but he responded with 17 tackles and made the game winning pass breakup in overtime to seal the win.
- Tyre West DE – An absolute terror in the QB’s face almost every drop-back. Recorded 2 sacks (both bone-crunching) and forced the fumble returned for a touchdown by Josh Josephs to flip the game.
Hero of the Week
- Jack Van Dorselaer TE – The true freshman tight end showed us exactly why you have to watch the game rather than the stats to understand why things go right or wrong. Van Dorselaer played a total of 6 snaps vs Miss State. He didn’t have a catch, he didn’t record any yards. What he did, was make the lead block that led Joey Aguilar to the endzone to tie the game and send it to overtime. Then, he made the key block that sprung a leak on the edge and gave DeSean Bishop a clear path for the game-winning score. That’s 14 points produced directly by a kid in his first big minutes who never even touched the ball. That’s how you play football.
Bust of the Week
- Josh Heupel’s Clock Management – This is the part of the program where we have to call a spade a spade. That final drive of regulation was egregiously bad clock management any way you look at it. I don’t defend it. Taking two timeouts with you to football heaven when you have a legitimate chance to win, could have easily cost the game. Had the Vols lost, it’s the only thing anyone would be talking about for two whole weeks and things would have gotten extremely uncomfortable. This is not the first time that Heupel has put too much faith into his tempo to save the day at the expense of timeouts. Let’s hope this close call was a learning experience. Heupel is a stubborn coach who like to stick to what he knows, but recently he’s shown more openness to change. For the sake of our blood pressure medication manufacturers, this is an area where I hope he starts showing growth soon.
Fact of the Week That May Interest Only Me
What if I gave you a defense and told you the following:
- This defense is ranked #1 in the country in sacks.
- This defense is ranked #1 in the country in forced fumbles.
- This defense is ranked #5 in the country in tackles-for-loss.
- This defense is ranked #10 in the country in passes defended.
Would you say that’s an okay defense? Would you say that the coordinator of this defense needs to be fired?
What if I then told you that the same defense that put up these numbers has been nowhere near healthy to this point in the year, hasn’t even scratched their potential, and may get some significant upgrades at CB and DT in the next couple weeks?
Is that good?
These are the rankings of the Tennessee Volunteers defense through the first 5 games of the season, 3 of which were against Power 5 opponents.
Tim Banks has always coached defense with an aggressive bend-but-don’t-break philosophy that is prone to give up yards, but stand tall when it matters. I think you’re seeing this play out in one of the most extreme ways I can remember. Defense isn’t always about yards – ultimately it’s about points and wins.
The defense is executing the plan. It may be a stressful plan, but it’s a real and viable plan nonetheless. Let’s let this play out before anyone keeps calling for Tim Banks’ head.
A Haiku For You
Survive and advance,
We are learning who we are.
Onward and upward.
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