Mike Leach once made the same comment about Josh Heupel that Joey Halzle made about Hendon Hooker last year
Tennessee Vols head coach Josh Heupel and former UT quarterback Hendon Hooker will always share a special connection. Together, Heupel and Hooker helped lead Tennessee to a memorable season in 2022. After years of futile efforts to beat Alabama, the Vols finally broke through last season, beating the Crimson Tide 52-49 in one of the […]
Tennessee Vols head coach Josh Heupel and former UT quarterback Hendon Hooker will always share a special connection.
Together, Heupel and Hooker helped lead Tennessee to a memorable season in 2022.
After years of futile efforts to beat Alabama, the Vols finally broke through last season, beating the Crimson Tide 52-49 in one of the best college football games of all time.
Heupel and Hooker also helped lead Tennessee to big wins against LSU and Florida last season.
The fact that Heupel and Hooker ended up in Knoxville together is total happenstance. Heupel was hired by Tennessee after the Vols fired Jeremy Pruitt due to an NCAA recruiting investigation (Pruitt's 3-7 record in 2020 didn't help his attempts to keep his job).
Hooker was one of the last players that Pruitt brought to Tennessee before he was fired. The Greensboro, NC native transferred to UT from Virginia Tech. Shortly after Hooker arrived in Knoxville, Pruitt was fired.
Maybe it was destiny that Heupel and Hooker ended up together at Tennessee. An old quote from the late Mike Leach, Heupel's offensive coordinator at Oklahoma in 1999, certainly seems to add to the idea that Hooker and Heupel's journey was destined to lead them to each other.
In 2000, during an interview with ESPN The Magazine, Leach suggested that Heupel was too uptight when he first arrived at Oklahoma. Leach said that Heupel was too intense and he would overanalyze everything
From ESPN: Their first year together in Norman, Leach knew he had to drain some of that intensity out of the kid. "He'd overanalyze everything on the sidelines," says Leach. "I had to tell him, 'Look, these guys are following you. You have to keep them loose.' " The next time he glanced at Heupel, Leach says, "Son of a gun if he didn't have this wide, overexaggerated smile. He wasn't trying to be a smart-ass. He was really just trying to smile."
That comment from Leach about a young Heupel sounds almost exactly like a comment that Vols offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Joey Halzle made about Hooker last year.
Ahead of the 2022 season, Halzle told reporters that Hooker played too tight at times and was too serious.
"Hendon was a guy who was way too far in the business model, meaning that nothing was fun," said Halzle last year. "Everything was serious. That wasn't his best way to play. For some guys it is. It is not for him. We had to spend a long time working on having him really just enjoy the game while working hard. Working hard doesn't mean serious all of the time, though. He is fun. He is enjoying himself and enjoying his time out on the field. That is what has allowed his talent to now take over again. He's not tightening himself up with his own mind."
Maybe Heupel and Hooker are kindred spirits. They certainly have similar stories, albeit with different details. Hooker and Heupel both helped rejuvenate historic programs after being relatively unknown players (Hooker was a bit more known, thanks to his time at Virginia Tech, but he was far from a household name). And they each forced their way into the Heisman Trophy conversation.
Sports are funny at times. Every now and then, the perfect coach inherits the perfect player and magic happens. And that's exactly what we saw go down last season on Rocky Top.
Vols senior explains tough conversations he sometimes has to have with Josh Heupel
A Tennessee Vols senior explained this week the tough conversations he sometimes has to have with head coach Josh Heupel
Featured image via Randy Sartin-USA TODAY Sports
