Tennessee
How did Tennessee football commit George MacIntyre’s first game in Knoxville go? Start with big TD
Editor’s note: As part of The Tennessean’s season-long, all-access series about the Brentwood Academy football program, we chronicled Tennessee-bound quarterback George MacIntyre’s first game in Knoxville, a 63-26 victory against Knoxville Catholic. To follow along with the series, please subscribe to The Tennessean here.
KNOXVILLE − The lights at Hollin Field flickered on the moment the clock struck 6 p.m. Thursday, an hour before Brentwood Academy senior quarterback George MacIntyre made his football playing debut in a city he’ll call his second home come Dec. 15.
The lights were shining on the Tennessee recruit long before then, though.
A couple of hours before the Eagles’ 63-26 victory at Knoxville Catholic High School, MacInytre chatted at length with a local TV reporter outside his team’s locker room.
An hour later, before MacIntyre so much as stepped foot on the field for pregame warmups, two men holding cameras glued their lenses to his every move.
That number had swollen to eight by the time MacIntyre weaved his way through traffic that included curious Tennessee fans hoping to catch an up-close glimpse before he marched onto the field with fellow captains Jacob Atkins, Darryl Hammond and Gavin Schaffer for the pregame coin flip.
Not to mention the blue and white ABC-5 truck with the satellite dish stuck to its roof it parked on the track behind the home team’s sideline, or the other local TV truck next to it that was there to televise the game.
None of the pomp, none of the circumstance phased MacIntyre.
“He’s so low-key about it,” MacIntyre’s father, Matt, said after situating himself at the tippy-top of the visiting bleachers before the game.
His play was anything but, though. He was 13-for-16 passing for 246 yards and two touchdowns.
‘Come here and handle business’
So, George, were you excited about Thursday?
About playing where you’ll soon be staying?
About the fact that your soon-to-be college coach, Josh Heupel, had a front-row seat for the show from the Brentwood Academy sideline?
Like, at all?
“A little bit,” he said. “I didn’t put much thought into it.
“We play a lot of long road games − Memphis, Chattanooga. It’s just the first time we’ve been in Knoxville. My thought was to come here and handle business.”
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The kid of few words let his play do the talking.
And talk it did.
Loudly and clearly.
Not a game of cat and mouse
MacIntyre planted both feet firmly on his own 15-yard line and barked out last-second orders before he took his first snap. Ball in his right hand, he surveyed the scene, cocked his arm and locked eyes with sophomore receiver Kesean Bowman.
Before eyes on him could blink, before those cameras could click, the ball went from MacIntyre’s right hand into Bowman’s hands, ending in the end zone 80 yards away.
This sort of scene repeated itself often.
MacIntyre to Bowman. MacIntyre to Neo Clifton. MacIntyre to Bowman again.
MacIntyre to William Cypers for a touchdown in the third quarter, too.
“There weren’t too many plays where I thought we were the mouse and the other team was the cat,” MacIntyre said.
MacIntyre and the Eagles (5-3, 1-2 in Division II-AAA East) were the cats this time.
Cats who are going into fall break, with an off week next week.
MacIntyre stayed behind in Knoxville after Thursday’s game. Plans to take in the Volunteers’ game Saturday against Florida, then head to the beach for a few days away from football.
Thursday night, though, was the first of what MacIntyre and the Volunteers hope will be plenty of great performances in Knoxville.
Paul Skrbina is a sports enterprise reporter covering the Predators, Titans, Nashville SC, local colleges and local sports for The Tennessean. Reach him at pskrbina@tennessean.com and on the X platform (formerly known as Twitter) @paulskrbina. Follow his work here.
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Tennessee baseball received a commitment from UC Irvine pitcher Ricky Ojeda on June 19.
Ojeda, who is eligible for the MLB draft in July, announced his decision on social media. He visited Tennessee on June 15-16.
The lefthanded Ojeda had a strong 2026 season primarily as a reliever, posting a 3.77 ERA with 62 strikeouts and 20 walks in 62 innings. In 2025, he became the first reliever to be named Big West Pitcher of the Year after going 13-1 with a 3.55 ERA and 83 strikeouts in 66 innings, which also earned him a third-team all-American nod from the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association and Perfect Game.
Whether Ojeda makes it to Tennessee remains an open question. Perfect Game ranked him as the No. 179 prospect for the draft. That would place him in the sixth round.
Should Ojeda join the staff, however, he would instantly become one of the team’s top options out of a bullpen that struggled immensely in 2026. The pitching staff is also under new leadership under pitching coach Austin Knight, who was hired from ECU.
Ojeda is the fourth player to announce they will transfer to Tennessee this offseason, joining two-way Mercer transfer Braydon Kersey, Northwestern State pitcher Brody Trosclair and Air Force infielder Wyatt Hanoian.
Who’s leaving Tennessee baseball
- UTL Jay Abernathy (Oklahoma)
- RHP Nic Abraham
- INF Ariel Antigua (Arizona)
- INF Finley Bates
- RHP Ari Bethea
- OF Hutson Chance
- RHP Sawyer Deering (San Diego State)
- OF Nate Eisfelder
- 1B Evan Hankins (Virginia Tech)
- UTL Hunter High
- RHP Brayden Krenzel (Arkansas)
- INF Manny Marin
- INF Ethan Moore (Missouri)
- UTL Chris Newstrom
- LHP Taylor Tracey
- C Cash Williams (West Virginia)
Who’s joining Tennessee baseball
- RHP/DH Braydon Kersey
- LHP Brody Trosclair
- INF Wyatt Hanoian
- LHP Ricky Ojeda
Emmett Siegel covers Tennessee baseball for Knox News. Email: emmett.siegel@knoxnews.com; X: @EmmettSiegel_
JACKSON, Tenn. (WBBJ) – An exciting day of sporting clays in West Tennessee is doubling as a major fight against hunger.
Today’s “Shooting Hunger” event took place at the Carroll County Shooting Sports Park in Huntingdon. It’s a partnership between Tennessee Farm Bureau, Tennessee Farmers Co-Op, Farm Credit Mid-America and Rural First.
Since 2015, Shooting Hunger has helped provide more than three million meals to Tennesseans with money going to food banks, backpack programs, and local hunger relief. A $500 scholarship will also go to the top youth shooter in each flight.
“We’re joining together to raise money for school backpacks to feed hungry kids. We do these, we actually do three of these across the state of Tennessee so at the end of the day we take, we take all the money we put it into a pile and when we divide equally amongst all 95 counties across the state of Tennessee,“ said Bryan Wright, executive vice president for the Tennessee Farm Bureau.
Organizers say events like this matter because one in six children in Tennessee struggle with hunger.
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Tennessee director of track and field Duane Ross gauged the hunger of the men’s 4×100-meter relay team to pull off the upset.
“They said, ‘Coach, we’re going to win,’ ” Ross said. “When they bring you that much confidence, you can grab your popcorn and enjoy the meet.”
No popcorn was consumed, but the appetite was there from the start.
Traunard Folson, Davonte Howell, T’Mars McCallum and Elijah Clark finished in a school record time of 37.98 seconds at the NCAA Outdoor Championships on June 12 in Eugene, Oregon. It was the the program’s first national title in the 4×100 since 1983 and the fourth-fastest in NCAA history.
Four other relay teams never crossed the line. Auburn, the two-time defending champion, had run an NCAA-record 37.75 in the semifinal, but had a botched handoff on the last exchange. Arkansas, the reigning SEC champion, also dropped its baton, along with Oregon and Houston.
McCallum said staying clean through a race of chaos starts with a focus on winning, even in practice.
“In the moment we can’t really worry about anything else, just what we can control,” McCallum said on June 18. “We came to practice every time with the idea of, ‘OK, we’ve got to make sure this is fixed, because we know if we run that time, we can win.’ “
It was the final event of McCallum’s college career. It didn’t fully hit until the long flight home to Knoxville.
“I was like, we really did it,” he said. “Now we have a school record, the first team to ever go under 38 seconds here.”
Whether belief had anything to do with what went wrong in those four other lanes isn’t something Tennessee’s runners can answer. It’s exactly what they point to for why theirs didn’t.
Clark, a freshman who ran the anchor leg, said winning was just a matter of starting the race.
“We knew we had it the whole time,” he said. “No matter who did what, what happened, we knew what the outcome would come to.”
Ross said the victory wasn’t a surprise inside the program either.
“I wouldn’t say unsung,” Ross said. “I’ve watched this team all year long, and we were expecting to come out of there with the championship. It was a tight competition down to the last event.”
Tennessee finished third in the men’s team standings with 46 points, its best total since 2002.
Howell, a junior who ran the second leg, said the belief behind the relay team’s confidence was built long before the race.
“Three of the four of us already ran under 10 seconds,” he said. “Last year we all trained together during the summer, all lived together. We already had the bond, and adding the freshman on anchor was just a cherry on top. He figured it out at SECs, ran a 10.1, season’s best, and we trusted him to bring it home.”
Clark said the title is already part of something bigger to him.
“The goal is to always make history,” said Clark, who was hired by Tennessee four years ago after a successful run at North Carolina A&T. “It’s been one of my dreams. To be able to be on the wall, especially at a school like this, I couldn’t ask for anything more.”
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