What This Story Is About
- The annual Border Battle between the Tennessee Volunteers and Kentucky Wildcats.
Why It Matters
- At 6-2, the Vols look to keep their College Football Playoff hopes alive.
- After Saturday night’s Dark Mode showdown with the Wildcats, the Vols will close things out with a road trip to Texas A&M, a home game against LSU and a regular season finale at Vandy.
For Context
- Josh Heupel is 5-0 against the Wildcats as Tennessee head coach.
Catch Up
- Tennessee is looking to bounce back from a heartbreaking loss at South Carolina. They’ll need continued success from their ground game and lead back Desean Bishop, who is 43 yards shy of becoming the 2nd UT player to rush twice for 1000 yards in his career.
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WVLT) – Dark Mode Activated/Neyland at Night!
Tennessee will don its new adidas “Dark Mode” uniforms for its first SEC night game this year, marking the eighth time in its history that UT will wear black jerseys and just the fifth time that it will wear black helmets, which debuted in the 2022 win over Kentucky.
Dark Mode = activated. pic.twitter.com/vNxfPJ9meT
— Tennessee Football (@Vol_Football)
The Vols own a 5-2 record all-time when wearing black jerseys, including a 2-0 record when doing so against the Wildcats (2022 and 2024).
After dropping their last game on a field goal as time expired two weeks ago at South Carolina, the Vols will look to rebound coming off their open week. UT has fared well following losses under head coach Josh Heupel, who has lost back-to-back games only four times in his nine seasons as a head coach…