Tennessee football suffered its first loss of the 2024 season on Saturday night as Arkansas upset the third-ranked Vols 19-14 in Fayetteville.
Following the game, Josh Heupel discussed what went wrong for the offense, the crucial running into the punter on Jordan Ross and much more. Here’s everything Heupel said.
Opening Statement
“Disappointing night for us as a football team, I didn’t think we handled, or started fast. Didn’t do the ordinary things at a high level. Offensively, hurt ourselves consistently there in the first half. They were able to extend some drives, some third-down conversions. End of the day, starting with me, it wasn’t good enough tonight. And between all three phases, we’ve got to find a way to be on the right side of the scoreboard. And we got to get better. So at this point you got an opportunity to come together, pull harder, fight stronger, play for each other and continue to grow. Still a lot out there, obviously, as everybody sees. But the main thing is we got to continue to get better.”
On what the issues were with Tennessee’s offense
“I mean, just early we find a way to get ourselves behind the chains early. You look at the first three drives, there was something that really hurt us. Man downfield, false start, holding, whatever it might’ve been. So you do that, you put their time of possession together and all of a sudden you’re looking at the scoreboard the way it was at the end of the first half. We got to play smarter, we got to play better up front. We got to play better with our skill players on the perimeter and we got to play better at quarterback. But again, it starts with me. We got all get better.”
On Tennessee’s struggles on the offensive line
“Conglomerate of multiple things. Some of it me, some of it our personnel not executing. So it’s a combination of all that.”
On not attempting a long field goal at the end of the first half
“Just felt like it was just on the outside of (field goal range). I know the wind had had changed just a little bit. It was a conversation that we had and that was a decision I made to try to work towards the sideline and get us one more shot.”
On if Jordan Ross was supposed to go for the block when he ran into the punter
“We were in a safe call, playing the fake. He is gonna contain the shield right there. As he got hit, when I talked to the official, I guess he may have hit him with his hands to the face too. I didn’t see the entire clip of it, but that’s what I was told.”
On if they let Arkansas score on the final play of its go ahead touchdown drive to get more time
“Yeah, at the very end of it, just with the clock timeout situations that we had trying to give ourselves a chance to go answer.”
On offensive line penalties, pinpointing the issues
“Earlier was on us, whether they clapped or not on one or two of them, I don’t know. We’ll see when we watch the tape.”
On what the final play, what the right play was for Nico Iamaleava
“Yeah, it’s a full concept read. He ended up scrambling off of it. End of the day, in that scenario, you got to get the ball up and give one of your guys an opportunity to go make a play. Nico, just like me, and just like our football team, wishes that we had played better. That situation, you can’t, keep the ball in your hands. You want to give somebody an opportunity to go make a play. He’s disappointed with it, but he’s got to come back and bounce back from it. He’s played way too good not to respond the right way. And I know he will.”
On why that has now happened twice (Joe Milton in 2021)
“Different situations. Older quarterback versus first guy experienced.”
On what it says about the state of college football that three top-10 SEC teams went on the road today and lost
“Says what I’m pretty sure I said on Monday. Man, in this league, you better come to play really good football, play smart football every single Saturday. Separation in this league is really tight and you know, we gotta get better. We come back in, we gotta get better and get ready to roll next week. And we haven’t been at home in a while. Look forward to seeing our fans. We gotta go play really good football to give ourselves a chance to go win.”
On how Arkansas was able to sustain long drives in the first half
“Running the football, converting on third down, and vice versa. We weren’t doing that. Weren’t converting on third down. We converted a couple third downs early in the third quarter, moved the ball to score points.”
On Squirrel White being in a sling and Bru McCoy being in a cast following the game
“I don’t (have an update). We will find out as we go.”
On what Arkansas was doing so well to make it hard on Tennessee to run the football
“Yeah, you know, structure was a little bit different than what they had shown on tape. I thought we adjusted after the first drive. As much as anything, again, shooting ourselves in the foot early and playing from behind the sticks and you know, then not being efficient on third down. So you put those two things together, that’s, you know, how you have a half like we did.”
On his message to the team after the loss
“Man, pretty simple. When moments like this happen, the outside world’s gonna have a narrative for you. We talk about it when it’s going good, and tonight it didn’t go good. You gotta look at your teammates in the eye. Those are the opinions that matter. You gotta continue to pull the rope harder. We gotta continue to grow. Good teams get better throughout the course of the year. Still have a chance to be a really good football team.”
