Tennessee’s offseason drama regarding the quarterback position has seemed to cause widespread hesitation on the Vols’ 2025 outlook here in the spring.
In late January, Tennessee held several Top 25 early rankings, including Top 10 spots from CBS Sports, 247Sports, Yahoo! Sports, USA Today, and Pro Football Focus, while On3 Sports, The Athletic, and ESPN had the Vols in the Top 20.
ESPN’s Mark Schlabach was the lowest on the Vols at the time but still had Tennessee at No. 19 in his January offseason rankings.
Fast forward to early May, and Tennessee has been dropped off some of those lists. In the last week, Tennessee has been absent from way-too-early rankings by Fox Sports’ Joel Klatt and a combination of six 247 Sports writers, and was dropped to No. 21 in Andy Staples‘ On3 Sports rankings.
Schlabach released updated rankings on Thursday with Tennessee missing the cut. Schlabach’s latest list has nine SEC teams ranked, including No. 3 Texas, No. 4 Georgia, No. 6 LSU, No. 9 Alabama, No. 13 South Carolina, No. 19 Florida, No. 23 Texas A&M, No. 24 Ole Miss, and No. 25 Oklahoma.
Tennessee will take on four of those teams in 2025 with home games against Georgia and Oklahoma and road games against Alabama and Florida. The other conference teams that make up Tennessee’s 2025 slate are Mississippi State, Arkansas, Kentucky, and Vanderbilt.
More From RTI: Where Tennessee Football’s Three Incoming Spring Transfers Land In Portal Rankings
The hesitation of Tennessee must be contagious with so many publications dropping the Vols anywhere from 10-15 spots out of the rankings this spring. The biggest difference between Tennessee’s team then and now is the quarterback position. The Vols parted ways with QB Nico Iamaleava at the end of spring camp and will roll into the fall with a quarterback battle between UCLA/App State transfer Joey Aguilar, Jake Merklinger, and George MacIntyre. It’s hard to understate just how much reach the quarterback position has, though.
The drop in rankings indicates a hesitation about just how good Tennessee’s offense can be with an unexpected quarterback switch taking place this offseason. While the initial position outlook isn’t as high without Iamaleava, we’ll have to wait until the season to see how everything unfolds when the season kicks off.
Tennessee Football wrapped up spring camp with the Orange & White game on April 12 in Knoxville. The Vols will now begin preparations for summer activities before fall training camp officially begins in August.
Stay tuned to Rocky Top Insider for more Tennessee football offseason coverage.
