Here Is What Coach Heupel Had To Say After Their Impressive Win Against Kent State

John Anthony | Sep 15, 2024

Tennessee head coach Josh Heupel and Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava (8) chat on the sidelines during a game between Tennessee and Kent State at Neyland Stadium, in Knoxville, Tenn., Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. / Caitie McMekin/News Sentinel / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The Volunteers have another impressive week this week with an easy 71-0 victory over the Kent State Golden Flashes, here’s what Tennessee Head Coach Josh Heupel had to say after the game.

In Coach Heupel’s opening statements he talks about how the fans showed up and showed out today “First of all to start with our fans awesome atmosphere coming back, Vol walk was electric, packed out.” Before opening up to question he had this to say about the team. “Started fast there’s some things that we got to clean up but all in all good performance defensively, controlled the line of scrimmage, got off the field on third down. Offensively we are able to run the football and create some big plays as well and special teams had a solid performance.”

When asked if he thinks it’s essential to play well before starting conference play Coach Heupel had this to say. “Every weeks it’s own identity…we prefer to play well, prefer to gain consistency in the execution in the fundamentals and technique. There was some things that we did well tonight and there where some things that we have to clean up too and take the next step as a program”

Coach Heupel had this to say when asked about Freshman wide receiver Mike Matthews. “Yea we had a lot of young guys to play some late in the football game some early… Mike is a guy that we have had great trust through spring ball and early part of training camp… we are able to use our four wide package now with him being healthy tonight…really excited about what he did but also  lot of our young guys too” 

Here’s what Coach Heupel had to say about how he thinks Tennessee Quarterback Nico Iamaleava played. “I thought he played really well, used his feet when it was time to use his feet there where a couple things early in the football game I think we had a drop early in the game over the middle of the football field, he missed on the little RPO that’s fundamentally not in a great position but all in all played extremely well, good decision maker.”

It’s been 16 quarters that the defense hasn’t given up a touchdown and this is what Coach Heupel had to say about that “Yea Tim (Banks) has done an amazing job building it…but how our players understand what we are doing fundamentals, technique and playing with them, playing really hard…the challenge of no matter who’s in the ball game to just go play to the standard of how we play, to win the fourth quarter. Really proud of how we played in the second half.” 

The Volunteers pushed it to 3-0 to start this season they travel to Norman Oklahoma to face the Oklahoma Sooner s next week in their first SEC match up.

Other Tennessee News:

• Tennessee Head Coach Josh Heupel Previews Matchup vs NC State
• Tennessee Volunteers Look Like True College Football Contenders
• Josh Heupel Updates Tennessee Injury Report - Rickey Gibson Available vs NC State

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