Tennessee conducted its first preseason scrimmage Saturday morning inside Neyland Stadium.
The biggest question facing Josh Heupel’s Volunteers — the quarterback race involving redshirt freshman Jake Merklinger, true freshman George MacIntyre and graduate transfer Joey Aguilar — was not answered.
“I’m not naming a starter today,” a smiling Heupel said in a news conference. “All three of those guys have shown some really good characteristics of doing some special things with the ball, as well as managing the game and eliminating negative plays. There are some things each of them and collectively as a group have to get better at, but that’s always the nature of it at this point in training camp.”
Saturday’s scrimmage, which was closed to the media, was also Tennessee’s eighth preseason workout. The Vols will take Sunday off.
Aguilar, a 6-foot-3, 225-pound, fifth-year senior from Antioch, California, made a combined 24 starts the past two seasons at Appalachian State and practiced this spring at UCLA before entering the NCAA transfer portal for a second time in four months and committing to the Vols in late April. Saturday marked his first competition inside Tennessee’s 101,915-seat venue that celebrated its 100-year anniversary in 2021.