Vols HC Josh Heupel shares his QB system game plan for the 2025 season

AtoZ Sports

Lucas Panzica discusses the comments made by Tennessee Volunteers Football head coach Josh Heupel during SEC Media Days regarding the deployment of his quarterback system for the upcoming 2025 college football season

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00:00During his rounds at SEC Media Days last week, Tennessee head coach Josh Heupel outlined one

00:04thing that he will absolutely not do with Tennessee's quarterback situation. We'll tell

00:09you what that is just ahead. Hey, Lucas Panzeca here from 104.5 The Zone and A to Z Sports. So

00:17we know Tennessee is locked into a three-man battle for the starting quarterback job. Joey

00:21Aguilar, Jake Merklinger, and George McIntyre vying for that spot to replace Nico Iamaliava.

00:27We don't know who's going to come out on top of that battle, but one thing we do know now after

00:32Josh Heupel appeared at SEC Media Days is they will not be deploying a dual quarterback system

00:38no matter what. He sat down in an interview with some of my colleagues at 104.5 The Zone,

00:43our afternoon show 3HL with Brent Doherty, Don Davenport, and Tennessee basketball legend

00:48Ron Slay, and Don posed that question. The idea of a dual quarterback system being something he

00:54and his coaching staff were considering. And Heupel led with a fact that I did not know,

00:58and many Tennessee fans may not have known, that he actually was part of a dual quarterback system

01:03during his JUCO playing days before moving up, transferring to Oklahoma, where he obviously

01:08won a national title. And then he went on to say, and I quote, that's tough to manage. You want

01:13somebody to be the starter. End of the day, we're going to find out who that is. Now, I don't know if

01:18this is something that Tennessee fans had considered. I know it wasn't exactly a part of

01:22our daily discussions on The Zone, if Tennessee could potentially roll out a dual quarterback

01:27system, but Josh Heupel has completely shut that down. And to be honest, we don't really see that

01:33in the modern era of college football or the NFL. As the saying goes, if you have two quarterbacks,

01:39you don't have any. So they're going to ride with whoever comes out on top of this battle. But

01:44there is one thing that this coaching staff has to try to do that they were not able to do

01:49in the 2021 season when Joe Milton won the starting job over Hendon Hooker. And then of course,

01:55Milton got hurt. Hooker came in and he drove the offense forward. Joe Milton won that job in practice.

02:01But when the lights came on, Hendon Hooker was the better man to lead that Tennessee offense in both

02:062021 and 2022. And we've seen these situations with Tennessee quarterbacks in the past, guys that are

02:13just gamers that may not be the best on the practice field. Joshua Dobbs comes to mind. How

02:18many times did Tennessee try to redshirt Joshua Dobbs before being forced to put him in and realizing

02:24he was by far the best quarterback to lead those offenses in the Butch Jones era? This coaching

02:30staff has to figure out a way to make sure the man that wins the job in practice is the man that is

02:36going to be the best option for this team when the lights come on. Now, to an extent, there's only so

02:41much that you can do in that regard. Some guys just click when the moment matters most. And we'll

02:47see if the guy who wins this job for Tennessee ends up being that guy throughout the course of the

02:52season. We know they won't be deploying a dual quarterback system. That's a good thing. But

02:56what they also want to avoid is having a guy go out there, fail to perform, and then start to get

03:02through that revolving door grasping for answers at quarterback. That has not happened yet in the Josh

03:06Heupel era. And even though we don't really know much about these guys, with the exception of two

03:10seasons for Aguilar at App State, there's not much reason to think that that's going to happen

03:14this year with the proof of concept that we've seen in the Josh Heupel era. But last week in

03:20Atlanta, he made it clear it's going to be one guy at the top of the pack, and they're not going to be

03:24messing around or trying anything cute with any sort of dual quarterback system in 2025.

03:29five.

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