‘It was important to me’ – Tennessee’s Josh Heupel explains the reasoning behind his most memorable quote of the 2024 season
Tennessee Vols head coach Josh Heupel dropped arguably his most memorable quote of the 2024 college football season after UT’s second game of the season.
After a blowout win against NC State in Week 2 in which the Volunteers’ defense allowed zero touchdowns and just 143 yards of total offense, Heupel, unprovoked, made it clear to reporters that the standard at Tennessee on a yearly basis is to play elite defense.
“Let me just say one more thing, the standard at Tennessee is to be elite on defense,” said Heupel. “This is the home of Reggie White, Al Wilson, Eric Berry.”
Heupel appeared this week on the first episode of The Mike Keith Show (sidenote: Mike Keith is such a pro’s pro) and he was asked why he made sure to drop that quote after the NC State game in between questions from reporters.
“First of all, those are three great names, and seeing those highlights, the violence that they played with, the intensity, their ability to make plays and change the game,” explained Heupel. “The standard is to be the best on defense, to have a championship defense. As we embarked, as our staff first came in here, there were some speed bumps that we had to navigate. Last year was the first year we had the depth on our roster, on the defensive side of the ball, to play the way that we were capable of for the duration of the season.
“It was important to me that our fans, Vol nation, [understood] where we were going as a program on that side of the football. And the guys that we had in the building on the defensive side of the football, it was important to them that they were going to take the steps that they had worked towards, and that was just the beginning piece of who we were going to be defensively last year. And there’s a clear understanding that greatness on the defensive side of the ball is expected and demanded inside of this program.”
Heupel clearly wanted Tennessee fans to know that the Vols’ elite defensive effort against NC State, or even the strong defensive performance from the Volunteers during the 2023 season, wasn’t a fluke.
It wasn’t a situation where Tennessee caught lightening in a bottle and just happened to have a great defense. No, this was the plan all along. And it’ll be the plan moving forward.
Heupel’s expertise may be the offensive side of the ball, but make no doubt about it — he’s simply a football coach at his core.
