Tennessee will play its fifth Southeastern Conference football game of the season Saturday night (7:45 on the SEC Network) when the No. 7 Volunteers host Kentucky.
Through the first four league contests, Alabama’s Jalen Milroe was the only opposing quarterback to face the Vols from start to finish.
The Wildcats could easily play multiple quarterbacks inside Neyland Stadium, with starter Brock Vandagriff having been pulled during this past weekend’s 24-10 loss to Auburn in Lexington. Gavin Wimsatt replaced Vandagriff, but the two combined on just 12-of-27 passing for 154 yards and two interceptions.
“Defensively, you’ve always got to know who the No. 2 (quarterback) is and have a plan for him,” Tennessee coach Josh Heupel said Monday during his weekly news conference. “It can be through injury or them playing multiple guys. Your defensive players need to understand what type of player that is.
“Certainly for them the quarterback run game is always a part of it, and in the second half this past week, they played the younger kid.”
Kentucky 12th-year coach Mark Stoops could not attend his weekly news conference Monday, because he was in Youngstown, Ohio, attending the funeral services for his mother. Wildcats first-year offensive coordinator Bush Hamdan spoke and said the staff would begin evaluating the quarterback plan for Saturday.
The Vols faced both Jackson Arnold and Michael Hawkins at Oklahoma, Taylen Green and Malachi Singleton at Arkansas, and Graham Mertz and DJ Lagway against Florida. Hawkins entered the game in Norman due to Arnold struggling, while Green sustained a knee bruise in Fayetteville on a hit by Vols defensive tackle Omari Thomas, who was flagged for a personal foul.
Mertz and Lagway rotated during the first half in Knoxville, but Graham suffered a torn ACL in the third quarter.
Though Hawkins, Singleton and Lagway didn’t start against Tennessee, they each led their respective teams to fourth-quarter touchdown drives against the Vols. Hawkins actually led two of them.
“For us, we have to do a good job of containing the quarterback run game,” Heupel said. “We have to understand that this game will have limited opportunities in terms of possessions during the course of it.”
Said Vols junior linebacker Kalib Perry: “Every SEC quarterback is more than capable of delivering.”
The dark side
The Vols will be back in black against the Wildcats, announcing Monday that they will be wearing their “dark mode” uniforms. Tennessee is 3-0 in that look under Heupel with routs of South Carolina (45-20) in 2021, Kentucky (44-6) in 2022 and South Carolina (41-20) last season.
Looking inward
Heupel was asked Monday whether he learned anything more during the open date in studying the past three games, when the Vols were held scoreless in the first half.
“There is not just one thing,” Heupel said. “A week ago against Alabama, we had turnovers on a couple possessions and missed field goals. We took sacks in the red zone. It’s a combination of all of us being a little bit better – coaches and players together.”
Matthews update
Tennessee five-star freshman receiver Mike Matthews still has just two receptions for 35 yards this season, with those catches coming in the 71-0 lambasting of Kent State on Sept. 14.
“Mike has gotten some opportunities, and I feel like there is a greater opportunity for execution at times when he’s out there,” Heupel said. “Some of that are the guys around him, and some of that is him, too. We need him to continue to come on and be a big part of what we’re doing here on the back half of this conference season.”
Odds and ends
Tennessee and Kentucky are playing for the 120th time and for the 81st consecutive year, with the Vols holding a commanding 84-26-9 series advantage. … Heupel and Stoops were assistant coaches on Arizona’s staff in 2005. … Tennessee will play its seventh night game of the season against visiting Mississippi State on Nov. 9, with that matchup either at 7 on ESPN or at 7:45 on the SEC Network. … Vols senior tight end and Alabama transfer Miles Kitselman on defeating the Crimson Tide: “It was great being able to see those guys who were brothers to me and will always be brothers to me. Being able to beat them was bittersweet, and I’ll never forget that night in Neyland.”
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com.