Josh Heupel on the health of Jabari Small, performances by Small and Tiyon Evans

Josh Heupel got his introduction to the rivalry between Tennessee and Florida yesterday, falling to the Gators by a score of 38-14. After the game, Heupel talked about the performances of his running backs, Jabari Small and Tiyon Evans.

“Jabari’s health, we will find out,” stated Heupel. “I thought he fought and competed hard during the course of the game tonight. A lot of production out of him.

“Beginning of the second half, one of those drives, I thought we did a great job of consistently running the football and picking up nickels and more than that at times. I thought they ran with great pad level, restraint, and effort. I thought we moved the line of scrimmage in the second half.

“I don’t think we did it consistently enough in the first half, a couple of those drives where we didn’t get it started. We’ll go back and watch the video and see tomorrow.”

Against Florida, each of Heupel‘s running backs had eleven carries. Small ran for 59 yards, while Evans ran for 50. Moreover, it was Small’s first game back from an injury that caused him to miss last week’s game.

Heupel assesses Hendon Hooker injury, Joe Milton vs. Florida

Last night, Hendon Hooker got the start again at quarterback for Tennessee. Unfortunately, he suffered an injury during the game.

Subsequently, Joe Milton got in at quarterback as well — despite not getting much work in during the week. After the game, Tennessee head coach Josh Heupel assessed his quarterback situation.

“I really didn’t want to play Joe in this game just based off of the amount of work he got during the week and where we felt he was at the end of the week,” Heupel said to reporters after the game. “I thought Hendon played hard, competed, made big times plays inside the pocket, used his feet, opportunistic.

“He had a play or two down the field that he didn’t connect on. I thought he handled the noise, the communication, for the most part in a really positive way during the course of the game. Handled the ups and downs and He continued to fight and compete and do it in a positive way there on the sideline in his demeanor, too. A ton of positives there.

“As far as his health. I don’t know where we’re at this point. We had a few guys that got banged up over the courses of the game, a little too early to tell where they’re at.”

The Vols scored two first half touchdowns and entered the second half down 17-14. In the second half, though, Tennessee could not move the ball well enough and did not score. Florida scored 21 points in the second half to ensure the victory.

Next up for Tennessee is a road trip to Missouri.

On3’s Jonathon Wagner contributed to this article.