NASHVILLE, Tn. — Tennessee head coach Josh Heupel met with the media at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel on Monday as part of a joint press conference previewing Tuesday’s Music City Bowl matchup against Illinois.
Heupel discussed what stands out about Illinois, why this game matters to Tennessee and much more. Here’s everything Heupel said.
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Opening statement
“Want to thank Scott Ramsey and the Music City Bowl staff. They’ve done a great job of hosting. It’s our second time here, continues to get better, but they’ve done a great job creating an experience for our entire program, our players with events throughout the course of the week, and have done a great job of taking care of our families as well. Really excited that we have an opportunity to play in this game. Great month of preparation, and get a chance to go out and play a really good opponent in Illinois.
Got great respect for Coach Bielema, what he’s done at Illinois, but really throughout his entire coaching career. Tough, smart, physical football team, and looking forward to going out and competing with our guys tomorrow in Nissan Stadium. A great venue for us to play and get a chance to do it in front of our home state, and looking forward to seeing the right shade of orange out there in big numbers tomorrow. So I’ll open it up for some questions.”
On what makes this an intriguing bowl matchup
First of all, it’s two programs that are playing at a really high level and I think the fact that it’s Big 10-SEC — two of the best conferences in the, in the country, it’s style and brand of football. The physicality that will be out there and you look at the quarterback play on both sides of the football. You got dynamic playmakers that are experienced, that play extremely smart and efficient. I think it’s got a chance to be a really good football game tomorrow afternoon.”
On what stands out about Illinois quarterback Luke Altmeyer
“I think he’s got great command of what they’re doing offensively. Plays extremely efficiently, very good, quick decision maker with the ball in his hands, pushing it down the football field. Their ability to run the football into heavy play action pass and push it down the field. Has been accurate in that way, but he’s got the athleticism to be a part of the run game as well. And it’s not a heavy load of what they do, but certainly situationally and field zone wise, he becomes the extra hat and they turn the numbers into their favor. Got great respect for him and what he’s done during the course of his career.”
On why the Music City Bowl is important for the Tennessee program
“I think the landscape of college football, of the expansion of the playoff certainly has changed the dynamics a little bit, but at the end of the day, for us as a program, this is an entire month where you get a chance to continue to grow and compete, develop your players that are on your roster. In a lot of ways it’s a finish to this season for this program, this staff, this group of players, but it’s also a springboard before you get back in January for all of your young players. Fundamentals, technique, growth in the scheme, opportunity.
You have some guys that are looking forward to the draft, right? That may not play. So all of a sudden there’s more opportunities for some of those young guys to go out and play. And, for us, when we were in this game four years ago, Jalin Hyatt — I told this story to our local media. Great story, had some success, but a little bit of up and down in our first season with him. His growth during the month of December knew he would play extremely well in this game, but it was really a springboard to his following season, his work habits, his attention to detail. His growth in fundamentals and technique. And that’s a guy that ultimately ends up winning the Biletnikoff Award — the best wide receiver in the country the following year.
So it’s an opportunity to have growth on the football side of it, but it’s also a part of building connection with the guys who are going be back. It’s an opportunity to come to the city outside of your home campus, have great experiences. These are memories are going to last a lifetime. As somebody that played this game, you remember these opportunities together.”
On William Inge impacting the bowl week prep
“Coach Inge, our entire defensive staff have done a great job. When we first got back on the field, slowly introducing the game plan. But meat and potatoes, things that guys have had experiences in and have great command but subtle tweaks and bring in some things that maybe he’s done in his past at Washington or other places for this preparation. And I think we’ve really grown throughout the course of the month and what our expectations are for this ball game. Understanding the opponent, situational football and getting dialed into the details of the game plan.”
On if any young players have had a month of practice similar to Jalin Hyatt in 2021
“I’m not going to say anything today. Hopefully after the ball game I’m able to talk about somebody, but I do think there’s been a group of guys, young guys that I’ve talked to just during the prep that I’ve really liked their focus, their attention to detail and how they’ve approached it.”
On Illinois being 0-4 in games its opponents have completed 70% of passes
“Tomorrow, it’ll be interesting to see the style of play defensively that Illinois wants to play early in the football game, different personnel groupings from them, a lot of different structures. For us, quarterback understanding the structures that he see in our wide receivers, recognizing that man-zone principles, being in the right spot and pass protection being really good up front as well. And so it’ll take all those factors working together to be as efficient as we need to against a really good Illinois defense.”
On his assessment of Bret Bielema over the course of his career
“Been in the same conference, been in different conferences at times. Faced each other before. I think his football teams are always extremely physical. Great defenses that are fundamentally sound, don’t give up a bunch of big plays. I think he pairs his three phases of the game together extremely well. There’s an identity inside of their program of how they want to play and how they want to attack people every Saturday and does a great job of getting all the staff his entire program on the same page. And that’s led to the amount of success that he’s had. And you look at the success that he’s had here at Illinois, it’s not shocking to anybody.”
On if there’s a plan to get George MacIntyre reps in this game
“We’ll just kind of see how the game unfolds and what the identity of the game is. Nothing where we’re planning on putting him in second series or anything like that.”
On if there’s an advantage of having played in Nissan Stadium in the past
“Our staff has a lot of familiarity with it. As rosters have turned over, there’s a lot of guys that have never been inside of that stadium. We were here four years ago for a bowl game a couple years ago for our season opener. We have some familiarity with it, but a lot of our players, a majority of our players have never been inside of it. So opportunity for us to be inside of a big-time stadium, a great venue, have a lot of our fans there, so everybody’s excited to play and you get a chance to go finish the season.”
