Tennessee wearing all-black uniforms for game versus South Carolina

Tennessee will be donning all-black uniforms for its matchup versus South Carolina this weekend at Neyland Stadium.

The Volunteers are looking for revenge after the Gamecocks upset them in Columbia, S.C., last season during the second-to-last week of the season. Tennessee entered with just one loss but left the Palmetto State with another as South Carolina won 63-38 in a dynamic contest.

⚫️𝙄𝙣𝙞𝙩𝙞𝙖𝙩𝙚 𝘿𝙖𝙧𝙠 𝙈𝙤𝙙𝙚 ⚫️ pic.twitter.com/QwOCv818aa

— Tennessee Football (@Vol_Football) September 25, 2023

It was the largest margin of victory for the Gamecocks over the Volunteers in the history of the series.

Tennessee head coach Josh Heupel addressed whether he thinks his team will have last year’s game on its mind during his press conference Monday.

“It’s a new week every week,” he said. “It is a new year too. Last year they were more physical than us. They competed harder than we did on that night. We didn’t handle the environment the right way. Those were lessons that had (we had to learn) to continue to move forward with as a program. But last year has nothing to do with this week. Last week has nothing to do with this week. Your previous play has nothing to do with the next game. We gotta focus on preparation and be ready to have a great competitive spirit for four quarters.”

Starting quarterback Joe Milton went down awkwardly during the past weekend’s game versus UTSA in the second quarter but was able to play the rest of the game with a knee brace. Heupel said that he expects that Milton will be at full strength for the game.

“Yeah I can’t believe it took this long to get that question,” Heupel joked eight minutes into his press conference. “For us I know there’s a picture out there. But for us, routinely on Sundays, we’re going to make sure that our players are healthy. We have a diagnosis inside with our doctors, but we’re gonna make sure medically they check up on him as well.”

Gamecocks quarterback Spencer Rattler will be entering the contest coming off maybe his best game of the season against Mississippi State.

He was 18 of 20 for 288 yards and three touchdowns as South Carolina won 37-30, which earned him co-Offensive Player of the Week honors.

“He’s a really good player,” Heupel said. “He’s played at a high level. He’s played a lot of football. He’s playing extremely well right now. He was dynamic in that football game. But he has that in his arsenal and, for us, the line of scrimmage is important. We gotta do a really good job. We gotta give him third-and-long. Last year we didn’t get off the field in third-and-long. And some of that was coverage. Some of it was, some of that was him standing and make some really special plays. We gotta do a great job of ling up and applying pressure at the same time.”