After a season that included too many lapses in focus — from coaches and players — it’s fair to suggest that some change is needed for the Tennessee Vols this offseason.

But it doesn’t need to be change just for the sake of change. Vols head coach Josh Heupel has to carefully evaluate what worked this season, what didn’t work, and what can be improved.

One change that I’ve seen some fans asking for on social media is at the offensive coordinator position.

Joey Halzle, who has spent his entire career with Heupel dating back to his time as a player at Oklahoma in 2006, just wrapped up his third regular season as the Vols’ offensive coordinator (his fifth season in total at Tennessee).

The Vols finished the regular season with the No. 7 scoring offense in the nation (40.8 points per game). It’s the second best offensive season under Heuepl at Tennessee (UT finished with the No. 1 scoring offense in 2022).

Statistically, there’s not much to complain about offensively. But any time a season ends on a sour note — as the Vols’ 2025 regular season did with the 21 point loss to Vanderbilt — there will be fans (and some media) calling for change. And offensive coordinator is almost always one of the positions that’s heavily scrutinized.

But I don’t think Halzle is going anywhere, nor do I think he should. And loudly demanding that Heupel make that change isn’t going to do anything but lead to a toxic situation around Tennessee football — which is something the Vols desperately need to avoid after regularly swimming in toxicity from 2008 to 2020.

Joey Halzle needs to stay right where he is at Tennessee

There’s a lot of mystery around Tennessee’s offense under Heupel and the way it operates. For starters, no one seems to know who calls plays for the Vols — though we did gain some insight into the process this week thanks to former Vols offensive coordinator Alex Golesh.

Golesh, who was recently hired as the head coach at Auburn, explained that the play-calling process in this offense is very “collaborative”.

“I’ll be honest with you, even going back to the Tennessee time, it’s always been a collaborative effort,” said Golesh of the play-calling process. “The offensive line coach is crazy involved. The wide receivers coach is crazy involved. The quarterbacks coach is crazy involved. We’ve got young coaches that are crazy involved.

“And when you get into a game, there’s so much conversation in between drives, it’s as truly a collaborative effort as you could ever imagine. I [give my] two cents at times — we all kind of do. And ultimately, the guy calling the plays, it’s on him to get us in the right spots. But it’s a constant communication. It’s a really cool way that we’ve done it. It’s collaborative up until the offensive coordinator makes the play call.”

I’ve suggested numerous times over the last couple of months that Heupel should offload some of his duties in the play-calling process so he can focus more on being a CEO on game days. But based on what we know about Tennessee’s process under Heupel, I think that’s something that probably needs to gradually happen. I think Heupel would benefit from giving Halzle more responsibility. And to be fair, it does seem like it moved that way this year, as there are rumblings that Halzle was more involved in play-calling this season than he was last season.

But if you think Heupel is going to fire Halzle and bring in someone like Chip Kelly to serve as the primary play-caller, I think you’re living in la-la land. This offense is Heupel’s baby. And it’s a good offense. There are things that can be improved, but the offense itself isn’t the problem (though Heupel does need to shed the wide choice/veer-n-shoot reputation, a la Lane Kiffin).

If you clicked on this article, it may have been because you saw the word toxic in the headline.

I’m getting to that part.

Asking Heupel to fire Halzle after the Vols averaged 40 points per game this season, while the defense finished ranked No. 92 in the nation in points allowed, would be asking him to do exactly what Bob Stoops did to him after the 2014 season at Oklahoma.

The Sooners finished with the No. 21 scoring offense and No. 56 scoring defense in 2014, yet it was Heupel, the offensive coordinator that season, who got fired after spending over a decade with Stoops. The relationship between Stoops and Heupel hasn’t been the same since.

I don’t see Heupel doing that to Halzle. I also don’t think it’s fair to ask Heupel to scapegoat an assistant coach the same way he was 10 years ago.

And as I said before, I also don’t think it’s necessary. It would be a different conversation if Tennessee’s offense was dreadful in 2025, but it wasn’t. Despite a ridiculous amount of youth and newcomers, the Vols still had one of the best offenses in the nation.

Tennessee’s offense is heading in the right direction. There’s obviously room for improvement. But we saw significant innovation and evolution from the Vols’ offense in 2025. I think that will continue moving forward.

2025 was a big prove-it year for Tennessee’s offense after seeing a dip the previous two seasons, and I think the results were pretty good.

Now, the game-day process certainly needs to run more smoothly. As Halzle continues to gain experience and confidence, we should see Heupel start giving him even more responsibility. And the hope for Tennessee is that Heupel will eventually get his offense to a point where he doesn’t need to be as involved, which will allow him to be a better head coach on Saturdays.

Firing Halzle would only set that process back, while potentially leading to total disaster for Tennessee.

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