Head coach Josh Heupel has become one of the better coaches in college football — having gone 27-12 over three seasons at Rocky Top with a 2-1 bowl game record — and the hype around starting quarterback Nico Iamaleava is real.
As such, the expectation for Tennessee is that they at least make the now-expanded 12-team College Football Playoffs, but they may be even bigger than that amongst the fan base.
With expectation comes pressure, but that’s not something Heupel is worried about. In fact, he believes his locker room can feed off it. Expectations are always high at Tennessee, anyhow.
“That’s just the way you want it. That’s why you come to Rocky Top,” he said at SEC Media Days (h/t On3). “They do care, 365 days out of the year. The expectations outside of the building are never going to be higher than what they are inside of our room. Yeah, and our guys in today’s landscape, you don’t block out the noise. But you can be intentional on what you let live in your headspace, versus moving it out of your headspace, and for us, this group has been really good at how intentional they are in their work habits.”
