How Tennessee Vols HC Josh Heupel officially became a UT legend on Saturday
There's something different about Tennessee Vols head coach Josh Heupel compared to the last few UT football coaches. And it's not just the on-field results. The three head coaches at Tennessee prior to Heupel — Derek Dooley, Butch Jones, and Jeremy Pruitt — never seemed "all in" in Knoxville. Dooley is the son of the […]
There's something different about Tennessee Vols head coach Josh Heupel compared to the last few UT football coaches.
And it's not just the on-field results.
The three head coaches at Tennessee prior to Heupel — Derek Dooley, Butch Jones, and Jeremy Pruitt — never seemed "all in" in Knoxville.
Dooley is the son of the late Vince Dooley, the legendary former head coach of the Georgia Bulldogs. He was always going to be a Georgia guy at heart (he played at Virginia, but he earned his law degree at UGA).
Jones embraced Tennessee, but he tried to put too much of a "sales pitch" on the program. It felt like Jones would've been just as happy at Michigan or any other "big-name school". Plus there were the rumors that Jones tried to find a way out of Knoxville after the 2016 season because he knew the end was near with Josh Dobbs off to the NFL.
Pruitt, the coach who preceded Heupel at UT, is as Alabama as it gets. Despite this, he did his best to wear the Power T, praise the Vol walk and the fans, and he even once lost his mind over the blatant favoritism that Alabama received during a game against the Vols.
But at the end of the day, Pruitt is still all Bama.
Heupel, like the three coaches before him, had no previous connection to Tennessee when he was hired. He won a national championship at Oklahoma and coached there for nearly a decade before he was unceremoniously dismissed by then-Sooners head coach Bob Stoops.
But despite not having a connection to UT, Heupel has embraced the program as if he played for the Vols. He's the first coach since Phillip Fulmer that feels like a natural fit at Tennessee.
Every time he praises the fan base it feels natural and not forced. It's genuine.
I mean, Heupel didn't even admonish the fans for throwing trash on the field against Ole Miss last season in protest of horrible calls and questionable injuries. He carefully danced around criticizing the fans. Instead, he just said that the atmosphere was as good as it gets for 59 minutes of the game.
On Saturday we got another great reminder of how "all-in" Heupel is at Tennessee via a legendary moment during the Vols' win against Texas in Thompson-Boling Arena.
While addressing the crowd, Heupel repeatedly mentioned wearing the right shade of orange (as opposed to the "burnt orange" that Texas wears), before telling the fans to show the rest of the country "who the real UT is" (another shot at the Longhorns).
Check it out:
I wouldn't have been shocked if Heupel would've broken out the "Horns Down" hand signal that Texas fans loathe.
You can't fake that. It's so obvious that Heupel loves everything about being a Vol. It's not just a job to him. And it's not a stepping stone to something bigger and better. He cares deeply about Tennessee as if it were his alma mater.
Heupel might be from South Dakota and he might have played at Oklahoma, but he's a Tennessee guy now. And I think if you pricked his finger, you'd see orange blood start flowing.
Featured image via Caitie McMekin/News Sentinel / USA TODAY NETWORK
