I'm not sure I trust Heupel running a well oiled machine like Sark. I see him more as a Lane Kiffin guy who will get a really good QB like Henden Hooker and be a 10-11 win guy, but then he'll have his Joe Milton and be a 9 win guy. Maybe that's good enough to get into the playoffs some years, but he hasn't shown enough to prove he can lift Tennessee to the upper echelon of the conference, imo.
He's recruiting ok, tho, so maybe he can sustain it. He looks to have a really, really good QB in Nico, but that kid has some work to do on his mechanics. If Heupel can fix those, I'll be a believer.
Since he's been a HC at Tenn since 2021, their recruiting has been between 10-22. 2021 (22), 2022 (17), 2023 (10), 2024 (14). He's either going to have to be a great HC and developer without top 10 recruiting classes, or he's going to have to get better at recruiting to sustain success.
I haven't followed their defense much at all, but this year they have a really good one. Looking at his recruiting classes he gets really good edge guys and LB, but I have no clue about DT/NT.