No. 19 Tennessee and Texas A&M are two teams who came into the 2023 college football season with some lofty expectations. To many, those expectations haven't necessarily been met as the season reaches mid-October, but on Saturday one will get a leg up on the other as the Volunteers and Aggies battle in a cross-divisional showdown featured as the SEC on CBS Game of the Week.
Texas A&M is coming off a gutting 26-20 loss to Alabama. The Aggies led 17-10 at halftime before an untimely interception, a blocked field goal and some shoddy pass defense doomed them in the second half. Texas A&M shut down Alabama's running game and hit some explosive plays during the loss, however, and should be able to challenge the relatively unproven Volunteers.
It is the first win for Tennessee head coach Josh Heupel when trailing at halftime. The Vols (5-1, 2-1 SEC) will look to play better next week in Tuscaloosa, but the win against Texas A&M (4-3, 2-2) keeps many of their goals within reach.
“I feel like it is what it is,” linebacker Aaron Beasley said. "We can have days where we are not at our best, and we expect the offense to have our back and I feel like we had the offense's back. And today, I feel like we had the offense's back even though they weren't having their best day. We had their back.”
The win on Saturday was the first for Heupel in which his team scored less than 30 points. It was the second-lowest total yard mark for Heupel at Tennessee, and the lowest passing yards while he has been in Knoxville.
“At the end of the day, we’re going to do our job and they're going to do their job,” Jeudy-Lally said. “The result is to be 1-0 at the end of the day and that’s what we did tonight. Regardless of whatever happens, we have each other's back, so no pressure is added at all because we practice it every single week”
Tennessee’s defense has come up big in several contests for the Vols. Texas A&M quarterback Max Johnson remained under duress for most of the night. Johnson was sacked two times, but took several hits on Saturday.
Texas A&M had one final chance. But on a fourth-and-10 play, UT cornerback Kamal Hadden intercepted a Johnson pass near midfield to secure the win.
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