At Saturday's Orange and White Game, Tennessee football unveiled its 2026 product to fans for the first time ahead of a pivotal sixth season in charge for head coach Josh Heupel.
The main story for Tennessee through spring practice and entering Saturday's game centered around the Vols' three quarterbacks. George MacIntyre, Faizon Brandon and Ryan Staub all took the field Saturday for snaps with Brandon and Staub doing so for the first time.
While the trio has made progress in ways Heupel wants, there is still lots of room to grow.
"Not everything, but you never accomplish everything," Heupel said. "But I do love the growth from that group. I love the way that they've competed with themselves, with each other."
MacIntyre enters the season with seven career pass attempts for Tennessee. Staub got some more playing time at Colorado, including one start for the Buffaloes against Houston. As a true freshman, Brandon has never taken the field for a college football game.
To that end, Saturday represents a dress rehearsal for the season. Tennessee's quarterbacks satisfied Heupel in that aspect.
"You want to see them in control of what you’re doing offensively, and a lot of that’s communication," Heupel said. "That’s on the field, signals, calls, motion, shift, whatever it might be. It’s also sideline mechanics. In general, I thought they handled themselves really well. Again, there’s a lot left out there for us to continue to grow into.”
The three quarterbacks rotated possessions during the game. Both Staub and Brandon led the Vols offense on touchdown drives while three of MacIntyre's four drives ended with punts.
With spring practice now over, Heupel still wants his trio of signal-callers to further improve before returning to the practice field in August. The Vols head coach carries high expectations into the summer for how the three men will conduct themselves over the next few months.
"Each of them," Heupel said, "has to be on their journey of building and mastering their fundamentals, technique, ownership and the scheme."
Tennessee's pass rush turns over once again this year with both stability and opportunity. Some players, like Daevin Hobbs look to be leaders and continue their roles. Others, like Tyree Weathersby, look to expand their roles in the new season.
With all his defensive linemen, Heupel wants to see both progression from December to now and a higher standard entering summer practices.
"A lot of great competition on the defensive line, interior and edges," Heupel said. "Some young guys that got some play last year that have got to continue to grow if we're going to be what we need to be up front."
Tennessee's defense took several penalties in Saturday's exhibition. While Heupel chalks some of those errors up to inexperience and limited football from his men, these mistakes still must be fixed come September.
"Some of the playing penalty stuff, it’s fundamentals and technique, and it’s your eyes, getting your body in the right position," Heupel said. "That has to continue to clean up as we go through even the summer, as you go through some of your installs and some of the time you get on the field and certainly through training camp."
Missing from the spring game was the key piece of the defensive front -- rush end Chaz Coleman. Coleman, who transferred the Tennessee from Penn State, went through the complete offseason conditioning program, but has been missing in several spring practices.
Heupel addressed Coleman's absence after the game by saying he has been dealing with off-field issues.
Overall, the Orange and White Game is a learning opportunity for everyone involved. Fans learned more about the three quarterback options, players learned about what it is like to play a game in Neyland and Heupel learned more about his roster to enter the second half of the offseason.