The Day After — Vols beat Vanderbilt 48-24
Tennessee closed out the 2023 regular season with an easy 48-24 win over Vanderbilt. We look back at a the Vols 8th win of the season with The Day After.
Hot and not
HOT
Joe Milton —Milton started hot and stayed that way with a career day. Milton was quick with his decisions and his accuracy was the best we have seen it in his Tennessee career. Maybe it was the fact that Hendon Hooker was in the crowd, who knows? But whatever the reason was, Milton was terrific on Saturday. He was the guy fans had hoped to see all year long.
The tight ends — The stat line is seven catches for 150 yards and two touchdowns. Seniors Jacob Warren and McCallan Castles have eight combined touchdown catches this season and in 12 games the duo has 26 receptions for 447 yards. The pair had six catches and two touchdowns in the in over Vanderbilt.
Both have also played a huge role in helping Tennessee rush for 2,431 yards this season.
Run defense —Vanderbilt finished the day with 78 yards rushing. It was the 5th time this season this Tennessee defense has held an offense to under 80 yards rushing. Tennessee had 7 TFLs and has 93 for the season.
NOT
The officials — It’s been a rough year for officiating in the SEC and the last weekend around the league didn’t disappoint.
Saturday’s game in Knoxville nearly got completely out of hand. Tyler Baron should have been flagged for a late hit. He wasn’t and from there things escalated and two snaps later the benches cleared and all kind of action was happening.
Helmets were being pulled off of players. Guys were leaving the bench area and yet somehow there were just a couple of off-setting penalties.
There are plenty of things to be addressed this off-season in college football and officiating should be one of them, especially in the SEC. It’s not been a great year to say the least.
Heupel and youth — It doesn’t make much sense to me, but in some areas there has seemed to be a reluctance to to play young players. That was the case again on Saturday. The score was 45-10 before Nico Iamaleava got on the field. Outside of Rickey Gibson, no young players played in the secondary. Only seniors played at the tight end position, the center position, and at right guard. It seems like it was a missed opportunity to get some young players some snaps to see where they are as you head into the off-season.
Defining moments
Milton to Keyton to get things started —Three plays into the game, Tennessee set the tone for this day with a 56 yard touchdown pass from Milton to Ramel Keyton over the middle where Milton hit him in stride with a dart.
Milton to Castles for six — With the game tight at 7,-7 Joe Milton threw arguably one of the best passes of his Tennessee career when he hit McCallan Castles for a 10 yard touchdown. The ball placement couldn’t have been any better.
Jaylen Wright’s first carry of the second half — Needing five yards to join the 1,000 yard club, Wright went 14 yards on his first carry of the second half. Wright had a tremendous off-season and it has showed every week this fall as he has averaged 7.4 yards a carry, good for second all time in school history. On Saturday he became the 19th player in school history to go for 1,000 yard in a season and the first player since Jalen Hurd did it in 2015 with 1,288 yards.
The final trip through the “T” — Tennessee had 36 players run through the T for the final time on Saturday in what’s one of the coolest traditions in football. This senior class deserved to be celebrated for what they have accomplished on the field and for the fact that they stayed and saw things through in what were some difficult and uncertain days after the Jeremy Pruitt firing.
Inside the numbers
383 — Milton’s passing total. It was Milton’s first career Tennessee game where he threw for 300+ yards. Milton finished 22 of 33 in arguably his best day as a Vol.
1,013 — Number of rushing yards by Jaylen Wright this season. Wright is the first back since Jalen Hurd in 2015 to rush for over 1,000 yards. For his career Wright has 2,297 yards which is good for 13th in school history.
8 — Number of touchdowns by Jacob Warren in his Tennessee career. The school record for a tight end in a career is shared at nine by Austin Denney and Ken Delong
98 — Number of penalties by Josh Heupel’s team this season. Last season the Vols were flagged 105 times and it was 89 times in year one.
Gameball
Senior Joe Milton was at his best on Saturday through for 383 yards and 4 touchdowns plus two rushing scores. Milton was 22-of-33 on the afternoon and had a couple of drops by the receivers. Milton’s accuracy was terrific, his decision making and timing was the best we have seen from him in his Tennessee career.
Biggest concern/question moving forward
Obviously, Tennessee has a bowl game to play and we will learn where they are bowling and who their opponent will be a week from Sunday.
But that’s not the biggest question or concern surrounding the program moving forward. The biggest question is simply roster management.
What COVID eligible seniors are going to return? Who enters the transfer portal? Who can Tennessee get from the transfer portal? How do they finish the signing class?
Roster management is not just a catch phrase in the current climate of college football, it’s the biggest element to being the CEO of a college football program.
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