Josh Heupel has officially moved on. Or at least, he wants you to believe he has. During a recent appearance on FM104.5 The Zone in Nashville, the Tennessee HC made it perfectly clear: no more talk about Nico Iamaleava. No more headlines, no more hypotheticals. From now on, any mention of the infamous QB saga that hijacked the offseason should be referred to simply as “the Joey Aguilar situation.” That’s not just semantics—it’s a message. Heupel is scrubbing the slate clean, even if the rest of the college football world can’t look away from the splatter left behind.

Because make no mistake: the damage was done. Josh Pate didn’t sugarcoat it while discussing the fallout on his show, laying out how Tennessee’s playoff buzz from last year collided with a bruising offseason of attrition and doubt. “Tennessee was in the playoff last year. Tennessee did not do a ton in the portal, yet they were a constant headline during portal season because of Nico leaving. And then they bring Aguilar over from UCLA, but quarterback changed,” Pate said. “There was a lot of question and still is on the offensive line, tailback, wide receiver, D-line.”

And here’s where it stings. According to Pate, even if Nico had stayed, those roster voids weren’t going anywhere. “Like I’ve been saying with Nico staying, there was going to be a lot of question about this team. He left and that’s kind of dominating the conversation. But beyond the quarterback position, there are questions on this team,” he said. But Pate didn’t stop there.

He tossed out a sliver of hope—one not based in roster talent or preseason hype, but in grit and unity. “But you know what could happen and this I cannot know. If that locker room galvanizes around what just happened, you could have a program and a group of guys that make the best of a bad situation and you have no clue how they’re winning every week, but they just are. And they overcome all the questions… and they just—they team their way. They grit their way to wins.”

That might be the only script Tennessee has left. The Volunteers didn’t hit the transfer portal hard. They’re banking on cohesion over star power, but the Nico exit created more than just a quarterback vacancy—it fractured the narrative. Between the failed NIL renegotiation rumors—the headlines that lingered longer than Josh Heupel would’ve liked—and this new QB swap, fans are feeling both skeptical and curious. Joey Aguilar, who flipped coasts from UCLA, now inherits the most radioactive QB job in the SEC. He will be replacing a storyline here.

Heupel wants no part of the past. When pressed on “the Nico Iamaleava situation,” the head coach pivoted. “Let’s start calling it the Joey Aguilar situation. At the end of the day, that’s just the landscape. You’re not going to keep everybody,” he said. “Got opportunities to put your roster together. I feel like we got a team that’s accountable, connected, works hard, competes hard, and we’re built to win. Now we gotta earn it every single day.”

He didn’t mention Nico’s name once. That wasn’t an accident—it was a statement. The Vols have reshuffled the deck, and Heupel is gambling that internal chemistry, not external buzz, will carry this team forward. “We got some new pieces that got to get onboarded here in the course of May, that’s the nature of college football,” he added. “So, we’ll get ready and keep competing.” That’s the plan—compete, regroup, and hope the locker room buys in. But as Tennessee leans into a new identity, one thing’s for sure: the margin for error is gone.

No Nico? No problem—Josh Heupel’s job is still rock-solid

Despite the recent curveball Tennessee got with Nico Iamaleava bolting to UCLA, ESPN’s Paul Finebaum isn’t sweating Josh Heupel’s job security—and neither should Vols fans. According to Finebaum, Heupel has built up so much goodwill in Knoxville that this season’s win-loss column might just take a backseat.

Speaking on McElroy and Cubelic, Finebaum said it loud and clear: “In the interim he is a hero… There’s no question on that conversation.” Even with the Vols facing quarterback uncertainty and the potential for a bumpy season, Finebaum is confident that Heupel is sitting comfortably in his seat—at least for now.

Sure, “ultimately, every coach is graded in the same way,” Finebaum admitted. But he pointed to Tennessee’s leadership and fan base as reasons why Heupel has earned some breathing room. “I guess I want to say it doesn’t really matter what the record is, and I’m going to say it really doesn’t matter what the record is this year, because Josh Heupel has earned the goodwill of that fan base and really of a lot of people,” Finebaum added. That’s rare praise in a sport where coaches usually live and die by the scoreboard.

Now, let’s not get it twisted—“ultimately, you have to win.” But in the short term? “I don’t know of a college football coach who is more secure than Josh Heupel.” Goodwill buys time in Knoxville.