Joey Halzle reveals the secret to what makes a great quarterback in Josh Heupel's offense

It’s no secret that Tennessee coach Josh Heupel’s offense puts heavy emphasis on the passing game. A former quarterback himself, Heupel has led his teams to finish among the top 10 in the country in passing offense in three of his five seasons as a head coach.

That included last year when Hendon Hooker helped the Volunteers to rank fifth in the FBS with 326.1 air yards per game. In a recent interview with Volquest, Tennessee offensive coordinator Joey Halzle explained the type of QB that Heupel looks for when building his roster.

“I think if you look at what the guys have had success doing what we’re doing have in common, they have that mindset of they’re ‘ballers,’ for lack of a better term,” he said. “When something breaks down they can get you right. When something is not the perfect play call or defense has a call against ‘ya, they get ‘ya out of it. That mindset of just being able to kind of wheel-and-deal and be the type of guy that can make the play.”

Heupel got his start as a head coach in 2018 at UCF and quickly turned the Knights into one of the top passing teams in the nation. After ranking No. 37 during Heupel’s first season, UCF jumped up to No. 8 and No. 4 in pass yards per game in 2019 and 2020, respectively.

That led to him earning the opportunity to coach at Tennessee in 2021, and the Volunteers offense has undergone a similar transformation just as quickly. Tennessee went from the No. 86 passing offense in 2020 to No. 40 in Year 1 under Heupel. This past season, the offense exploded as Hooker threw for 3,195 yards 27 touchdowns and just two interceptions while leading the Vols to an 8-0 start.

Hooker is on to the NFL now, but Joe Milton is ready to step in as starter. He played in the Orange Bowl after Hooker suffered an ACL tear late in the season and went 19-of-28 for 251 yards and three touchdowns.

Halzle went on to emphasize that mindset is the most important thing for a quarterback to have in the Josh Heupel offense, but added that both Hooker and Milton have the physical tools as well. With that combination, the Volunteers passing attack will hope to keep humming along in 2023.

“That doesn’t matter how tall you are, how fast you are,” Halzle said. “We had a guy at UCF that threw for 4,000 yards and he doesn’t look anything like Joe Milton or Hendon Hooker. So if you have that mindset, you can perform here at a really high level. Now you take it and you put it with all the tangible those guys have and you get a Hendon Hooker performance. You get what Joe did in the Orange bowl. You can do some really special stuff.”