Josh Heupel again forced to defend Tennessee Vols' offense ahead of the 2023 NFL Draft
The Tennessee Vols have several offensive players — QB Hendon Hooker, WR Jalin Hyatt, WR Cedric Tillman, and OL Darnell Wright — that should be selected in the early rounds of the 2023 NFL Draft. Several of those players should be guaranteed first-round picks, but that's not the case. And it's mostly because there are […]
The Tennessee Vols have several offensive players — QB Hendon Hooker, WR Jalin Hyatt, WR Cedric Tillman, and OL Darnell Wright — that should be selected in the early rounds of the 2023 NFL Draft.
Several of those players should be guaranteed first-round picks, but that's not the case.
And it's mostly because there are some questions about whether or not Tennessee's up-tempo offensive scheme is to credit for their production at UT.
Vols head coach Josh Heupel has defended Tennessee's scheme and his players multiple times over the last several months, repeatedly suggesting that it's "players not coaches" that's made the Vols successful over the last two years.
Heupel defended his scheme last week one last time ahead of the draft during an appearance on 104.5 The Zone's 3HL. The Tennessee head coach was asked about he feels about the criticisms of the Vols' offense.
"I mean, our splits are different than that of a lot of people inside of college football," explained Heupel. "I'd love to not get any questions about our offense from GMs, coaches, and [them] trying to take some of it."
"Inside the landscape of what we do, I think you know, 15 years ago tempo offense, it was really vanilla and bland," continued Heupel. "But the amount that we put on our quarterback — he is a decision-maker in everything that we're doing. Every single play, run-run checks, pass-run, loaded box alerts, kills for NFL verbiage. He controls the whole thing and he'll (Hooker) be ready to go play."
The folks that are criticizing Tennessee's offense aren't inside the offensive meetings, they aren't sitting in the quarterbacks' meetings, and they don't know the verbiage that UT's offensive coaches use. They also don't know exactly how the Vols' offense operates (Heupel, as he alluded to with his comments, notoriously keeps things as mysterious as possible with the Vols' offense).
Essentially, analysts are criticizing Tennessee's offense and trying to poke holes in their scheme because it's something they don't understand. And because of that, Heupel, mainly for recruiting purposes, is constantly having to defend UT's offense. Maybe that will change as players from Tennessee start to find success in the NFL. But for now, it's probably something that Heupel and the Vols will have to deal with for the foreseeable future.
