After taking some hard hits against Alabama, Joey Aguilar apparently suffered a neck injury at the end of the game. Coach Josh Heupel confirmed that Aguilar did suffer some knocks, but affirmed, “he’ll be ready to go on Saturday” against the Kentucky Wildcats. Despite injury concerns, Aguilar pulled out one of the best performances this season, leading the Volunteers to a 56-34 win. After the game, Joey Aguilar appeared in front of the media and gave a major health update.

“Body feels great. You know what I mean?” Joey Aguilar said on the post-game press conference this Saturday. “Had a great preparation this week in the training room, getting my body right. Ice tub, cold tub, but you know that that’s part of the game, you know what I mean? You get banged up a little bit. You’ve just got to go out there and fight through it.”

Last week, during the game against Alabama, Aguilar got hit hard while running towards the end zone from the Alabama 2-yard line, but lost 2 yards as he was sacked by Alabama’s Justin Jefferson and DaShawn Jones. The QB was sidelined for medical attention. However, before the Volunteers’ next possession, Joey stepped in and completed 28 of 44 passes for 268 yards for 1 touchdown, 1 Interception, and got sacked 4 times. The QB’s brave attempt went in vain as Tennessee lost its game to Bama by 20-37, marking their second loss.

However, the comeback he pulled against the Kentucky Wildcats on Saturday was exceptional, marking his career-best performance, statistically. Aguilar completed 20 of 26 passes for 396 yards for three touchdowns, and no interceptions. This is the highest passing yards in a single game this season. This made Tennessee secure a dominant 56-34 win, keeping them alive in the playoff race with a 6-2 record. He also passed 35 yards 5 times and 50 yards three times.

Tennessee’s Joey Aguilar Does The Unthinkable

Aguilar’s 396 passing yards against Kentucky are among Tennessee’s all-time single-game passing records. With this, he enters the program’s Top 15 list at No.13, just below Erik Aigne, who passed 397 yards against Kentucky in 2007. This does not end here, as the passing record broke multiple SEC records this season.

Joey Aguilar now leads the SEC with 2,344 yards, surpassing Alabama’s QB Ty Simpson’s 2,184 yards. He also leads the SEC in average passing yards per attempt with 9.3, and average yards per game with 293 yards. He scored 18 touchdowns so far, until week 8, equalling Arkansas QB Taylen Green for the second position, with 2 touchdowns behind Ty Simpson (20). Since 2023, Joey has thrown 200+ yards in 32 straight games.

Aguilar also commented on the remarkable win against Kentucky after the game, “I mean, definitely. I mean, I think we had to bounce back as a team in general. We had a lot of mental mistakes and things that we could have controlled from last week. We’ll never be perfect, but we could be pretty close. And we went out there, had a great week of preparation, and just executed and did what we had to do, and controlled what we could control.”

This is a must-needed comeback win for the Volunteers, and we need to see how far the passing offensive domination plays in the rest of the matchups this season.