Tennessee football coach Josh Heupel met with the local media Thursday for the final time before the Vols travel to Florida to open up SEC play in Gainesville.
The Vols are looking for their second consecutive win in the rivalry and are looking for their first win in Gainesville since 2003.
Heupel discussed dealing with the crowd noise, Cooper Mays’ injury update and much more. Here’s everything Heupel said Thursday.
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On preparing for the crowd noise, the challenge of the first road game
“The communication, in particular, on offense is a huge deal. Defensively you end up dealing with it while you’re at home. There’s things that we do during training camp. We actually have portions of our training camp where we work on the mechanics of playing in this type of environment. Guys have been good this week. You try to create crowd noise and simulate those things but obviously the environment is tough to entirely simulate here in practice. We work through all those things. We have to handle it in a really positive way here on Saturday night.”
On what he’s seen from quarterback Graham Mertz in his first two games at Florida
“For Graham, I think he’s increased his mobility— having known him all the way back to when he was in high school. He’s been a really sound decision maker for them. I think his experience that he has, the first couple weeks but also of the time he spent at the previous spot (Wisconsin). He’s ready for these types of games and environments. We have to do a great job, I said it, we have to apply pressure to him. Make him uncomfortable in the pocket but a lot of that starts with being really efficient defensively on first and second down. You have to do a good job with the run game.”
On what it would mean for the program to win back-to-back against Florida
“Man, I don’t think about that. Our team doesn’t think about it. Yesterday has nothing to do with today. This thing is solely about Saturday night and this football team being able to reset and play each play independently for 60 minutes.”
On if he felt like practice was turned up a notch after Tennessee players said they needed to
“I said it earlier this week but I didn’t feel like our preparation was off last week either. There were some things situationally that we have to be better in, in particular offensively, but some things defensively too. We need to continue to compete in your preparation up until kickoff. This week’s been really good. Obviously you’re starting league play, you understand the type of opponent and type of environment you’re going into. It’s got everybody’s complete attention.”
On Keenan Pili’s role with the team since his injury
“He was gone for, I don’t know, a day. Then was right back in the building. He’s approached it like he’s playing. He’s been really good with his teammates and really is kind of approaching it like a coach would. He’s got a great impact on our football team.”
On if he expects Cooper Mays to make the trip to Florida
“He’ll be going with us (to Gainesville). He’s been really good all week long. Anticipate him being ready to play.”
On what that means for the offensive line
“He’s smart, he’s competitive. He communicates at a really high level. His experience is beneficial for us.”
On if he thinks Mays will play the entire game or split reps
“Conditioning is one thing but even before he was back on the grass with us there was a lot of things he was doing with our strength staff. The flow of the game will dictate a little bit (of how much he plays), how he’s feeling out there. That type of thing.”
One Response
If Milton would be more accurate with the ball to our receiver’s we could come away with a win. If not we can’t run the ball and win. So good luck Milton. I’m