As revealed on Sunday, Tennessee (8-4) and Illinois (8-4) will square off in the Music City Bowl to close down each team’s respective season on Dec. 30 in Nashville, TN. The game will be played in Nissan Stadium, home of the Tennessee Titans.
The Fighting Illini put together an eight-win season with a veteran roster that saw a good bit of carryover from the previous season. Illinois was in the upper half of the Big Ten in offensive scoring (29.3 PPG) and the bottom half in defensive scoring (23.3 PPG). Offensively, the Fighting Illini were fairly average through the air and a bit below average on the ground. Illinois’ best win of the season came in late September when it took down Southern Cal in a close game, 34-32.
Tennessee opened the game as a 6.5-point favorite, but that line has already moved down to 5.5 points. It’ll be interesting to see just how much movement it has with more than three weeks still remaining until the game.
ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg has made a score prediction for every bowl game this postseason, including the playoff slate. As far as the Music City Bowl goes, he’s got Tennessee winning and covering. Rittenberg’s early projection has the Vols on top, 37-30.
“There will be plenty of orange in Nissan Stadium, although much of it won’t be cheering for Illinois, which caps a season that began with CFP hopes, was sidetracked sharply with a 53-point loss at Indiana but still ended with wins in three of the final four regular-season contests,” Rittenberg writes. “Illini quarterback Luke Altmyer started his career in the SEC at Ole Miss and can finish it against an SEC opponent in Tennessee, which pursued him as a transfer target this spring after Nico Iamaleava’s exit to UCLA. The Vols never really recovered from their early loss to Georgia and have much to sort out on defense, which ranks 91st nationally in points allowed. Expect a lot of scoring in this one, but Tennessee prevails behind quarterback Joey Aguilar.”
More From RTI: Who Will Replace Tim Banks? Tennessee Football Defensive Coordinator Hot Board
Considering the over/under is currently set at 61.5 by DraftKings, the over would hit by a decent margin in Rittenberg’s prediction. One interesting note that will impact the game and could impact the betting numbers is that Tennessee parted ways with defensive coordinator Tim Banks on Monday. The Vols look to be promoting William Inge, the linebackers coach, to the interim position for the Music City Bowl.
Banks spent five seasons with Tennessee and was originally on Josh Heupel’s inaugural staff on Rocky Top. Coming off a magnificent defensive season in 2024, Tennessee just didn’t have things put together well in 2025. The Vols battled injuries, particularly to star cornerbacks Jermod McCoy and Rickey Gibson III, but the third-to-last-ranked scoring defense in the SEC prompted Heupel to make a change on his staff.
Tennessee won’t have any seismic shifts to its defense by promoting from within for the bowl game, but it’ll be interesting to see what happens with the Inge-led defense against the Illini.
Illinois and Tennessee will square off in the Music City Bowl at 5:30 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Dec. 30, in Nashville, TN. Stay tuned to Rocky Top Insider for more coverage of the Tennessee bowl season.
