What We Know About Tennessee Football’s Quarterback Decision Ahead of Game vs. Alabama

One of the biggest developments for the Vols as of recently has come at the quarterback position. This is due to the fact that George MacIntyre earned his first start in his college career after Faizon Brandon suffered an injury against the Texas Longhorns and was benched in the game against the Auburn Tigers.

While MacIntyre had a decent performance against the Razorbacks, both quarterbacks have been listed as co-starters, leaving many with reason to believe a QB announcement is coming.

What We Know

As expected, Josh Heupel wasn’t ready to name the starter for the upcoming game against the Alabama Crimson Tide. Here is what he had to say.

“We’ll find out here through the week. So, we get on the grass tomorrow and we’ll work towards Saturday.”

This is a big-time announcement, especially if Brandon is healthy, as he will have to make a decision based on who he trusts to lead the offense in the future. Of course, he has driven the narrative home that the Vols will need both guys, which has already proven to be true throughout the season, as both quarterbacks have played a good number of snaps, and both have also started at least one game.

While this is a decision that will need to be made sooner rather than later, many believe that the quarterback could be MacIntyre after he helped the Vols win on the road against Arkansas with a 247-yard passing performance. This wasn’t exactly the prettiest, as he did finish with a total of three turnovers, but it does seem fair to say that at least one of these wasn’t his fault.

Heupel had the chance to go back and evaluate his gunslinger form the game, and had this say.

“Yeah. I thought he was decisive with the football. He was going to the right spot. Made some plays. Did some things inside of the pocket that were really positive. You know the third down makes a guy miss, keeps his eyes down the football field. Collectively as a group we got to do a better job taking care of the football. We got to play smarter and not make it more difficult on ourselves to pre-nap penalties whatever it might be. So, a lot to clean up collectively as a group but he did a good job.”

As for Brandon, the biggest thing for him is getting healthy. He wasn’t at 100% on Saturday, which is part of the reason Heupel made it clear he was only going to be used in an emergency setting. With that being said, if he is healthy then maybe the Vols make the move to announce him as the starter again.

This is something wirth keeping an eye on, and a decision could be coming soon, as practice was held on grass for the first time this week on Tuesday.

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