Time for Josh Heupel to leave Tennessee, embrace Penn State

Josh Heupel’s peak at Tennessee resides behind him. Might be time to look ahead, to Penn State.
Tennessee fans are hot under collar after loss to Oklahoma eliminated it from CFP contention.
Hot-seat talk premature now, but doesn’t take long to warm up in college football’s current landscape.

Because, the natives are getting restless in Tennessee, in case you haven’t noticed. Here’s Heupel’s chance to stay one step ahead of the Tennessee posse.

That’s Heupel’s theme music!

For a time, Heupel’s theme music sounded like the second-sweetest tune in all of East Tennessee. (Can’t top “Rocky Top,” of course.) Now, the tune is off-key.

Former Vols quarterback turned podcaster Jonathan Crompton recently dubbed Heupel as Tennessee’s James Franklin. He’s not the first to make that comparison. Fans are hot under the collar after Tennessee’s loss to Oklahoma that eliminated the Vols from playoff contention.

Of course it’s absurd, but when media mouthpieces insist a coach isn’t on the hot seat, that’s a canary in the coal mine. Franklin went from not on the hot seat to fired in the span of two weeks at Penn State. Same for LSU’s Brian Kelly.

A coach either stays one step ahead of the posse, or the posse catches him and treats him like the ribbon-bullies treated Kramer. Or, win a national championship. Those are the options. The only options.

Tennessee’s not a bad job. Penn State is not a distinctly better one. They’re two sides of the same coin. Good jobs, both of them. High expectations, each of them. If I’m a coach like Heupel who’s never won a playoff game, I’d feel a whole lot more comfortable in Year 1 or Year 2 than I would in Year 6, as Heupel would be entering at Tennessee next season.

Has Josh Heupel reached his Tennessee ceiling? If so, time to leave

Heupel raised the bar too high, too quickly. He’ll struggle to ever surpass 2022. That magical season became coffee table book material. Literally.

At Penn State, he’d reset the clock and chart a fresh course. Maybe create some new literature.

Heupel owes the Vols no loyalty pledge. Tennessee is indebted to him. Heupel stepped in at Tennessee’s dire hour after Jeremy Pruitt. Pruitt, dubbed ‘Cornbread’ by Vols fans, soaked the program in kerosene.

Tennessee’s administration and a toothless NCAA made sure a match never ignited the fuel and toasted Pruitt instead. Heupel took care of the rest. He pulled the Vols back from the abyss.

By Heupel’s second season, with Hendon Hooker slinging touchdown passes, and the Neyland Stadium goal posts swimming in the river while Nick Saban left town a loser, the phrase “Feels like ‘98” stopped being sarcasm. Then, Heupel broke through the playoff padlock last season. It’s a what-have-you-done-for-me lately business, though.

The Big Orange ache for a national championship as badly as any fan base. This team, in Heupel’s fifth season, won’t sniff one.

Tennessee slinked out of the playoff picture on the first day of November. No one with reasonable expectations should be shocked. Heupel had tepidly restocked his roster with just a handful of transfers. Then, the starting quarterback called it quits at Tennessee and packed up for the left coast in April. That development did not portend a playoff pursuit. But, rabid fans with reasonable expectations is sort of contradictory, you know?

If Heupel loses to either Florida or Vanderbilt this month — let’s face it, the Vols could lose both rivalry games — and if next season looks similar to this one, well, I don’t need to tell you where this ends.

Josh Heupel would be a treasure for Penn State, as he once was for Vols

As Heupel’s stock absorbs a hit in Tennessee, candidates with his credentials remain in short supply within this wild coaching carousel. He’d be a boon for Penn State. Now’s his time to strike, while his resume remains catchy.

Before Heupel’s Tennessee revival, Franklin staged one at Penn State. Franklin stayed too long. The posse got him.

Exiting Tennessee for Penn State would be a lateral move, but it’s a move with an easier path to the playoff. That’s what this sport is now, for programs like Penn State or Tennessee: Playoff or bust.

I can’t fault fans’ demands, either, not when they must pay a “talent fee” for the right to watch games in Neyland Stadium. That’s money well spent if watching the home team rumble toward the playoff. When the Vols commit three turnovers in a whimpering loss to Oklahoma, it must feel like a con.

Heupel’s offense consistently ranks among the SEC’s best, but it’s not the novelty it used to be. Other SEC teams like Mississippi and Mississippi State run a similar system.

Take that offense up North, and it would be a revelation inside the Big Ten. Imagine Purdue or Rutgers or Maryland trying to defend Heupel’s track meet. He’d be the Big Ten’s sharpest edge of offense east of Curt Cignetti. For all of Franklin’s accomplishments, nobody accused him of being a savant of offense.

In fact, the Heupel-Franklin comparison misses the mark. Heupel is better against Top 25 opponents. He beat Saban in his second attempt and beat Saban’s successor, Kalen DeBoer, in his first try. Franklin never beat Ryan Day.

And yet those comparisons are being made in Tennessee, and the good vibes from 2022 have turned to mist.

Up in Pennsylvania, they know what to do when the canary begins coughing in the coal mine. Get out before it’s too late. Head to Penn State.

Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network’s senior national college football columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer.