Tennessee’s next SEC road trip comes with a familiar backdrop and an early afternoon start.
The Vols will face Arkansas on Oct. 10 at 4:15 p.m. on the SEC Network, the league announced Monday as it finalized kickoff times and TV designations for games that weekend. Tennessee will be back in Fayetteville for its first conference road game of the season, and it will be the program’s third trip to Donald W.
Reynolds Razorback Stadium in the last seven seasons after losses there in 2020 and 2024, both at night. Tennessee’s last win in Fayetteville came in 2001.
The Arkansas game was one of five SEC matchups Tennessee had listed as FLEX options when the league announced television windows in June. Those games could have landed in the afternoon or in primetime, and Arkansas ultimately landed in the afternoon slot.
The same FLEX group included Auburn, Alabama on Oct. 17, Texas A&M on Nov. 14 and LSU on Nov.
The rest of Tennessee’s SEC schedule is now taking shape, too. The Nov. 7 game at Kentucky and the Nov. 28 game against Vanderbilt are set for night kickoffs, while the Oct. 24 game at South Carolina has been tabbed for an afternoon start.
Tennessee opened the year with an afternoon kickoff against Furman, then went to night games at Georgia Tech and against Kennesaw State. Saturday’s loss to Texas was already locked in as an ABC noon kickoff.
The Auburn game at Neyland Stadium will start at 3:30 p.m. on ESPN.
Arkansas enters the matchup at 2-2 under first-year head coach Ryan Silverfield, who was hired from Memphis to replace Sam Pittman. Pittman was dismissed five games into the 2025 season with a 32-34 overall record.
He had two wins against Tennessee, though the 34-31 loss in Knoxville last season came after his firing. Arkansas then dropped all seven games under interim coach Bobby Petrino.
Silverfield went 50-25 in six seasons at Memphis. The Tigers finished in the top 25 after an 11-win season in 2024, but they never finished higher than third in the American Conference and never reached the league title game. Silverfield also beat Arkansas last season.
His start in Fayetteville has been uneven. Arkansas was blown out by ranked Utah, 43-10, on the road and ranked Georgia, 45-17, at home, before regrouping with a 34-6 win over Tulsa last week.
The Hogs opened the season by beating North Alabama, 31-14. They are also a 15.5-point underdog at Texas A&M this week.
Tennessee’s roster includes two former Arkansas players in defensive back brothers TJ Metcalf and Tevis Metcalf, who were part of the 2024 win against the Vols. Arkansas has two former Tennessee players of its own in kicker Max Gilbert and starting safety Christian Harrison, who played at Cincinnati in 2025 before returning to the SEC.
Even with its struggles in Fayetteville, Tennessee still owns a 14-7 edge in the series. The programs, based in bordering states but on opposite ends of those states, played only three times before Arkansas joined the SEC in 1992.
They were then separated into different divisions, with Tennessee in the East and Arkansas in the West. This will be the third straight season the teams have met, something that hadn’t happened since Tennessee and Arkansas played 11 consecutive seasons from 1992 to 2002.
In Other News...
Texas Had To Address A Tennessee Celebration Vols Fans Wont Forget
Texas left Neyland Stadium with a hard-earned 20-17 win over Tennessee, but some of the attention afterward centered on behavior rather than the final score. Head coach Steve Sarkisian met separately with Colin Simmons and Raleek Brown to address celebrations that crossed the line, including the unsportsmanlike conduct penalty Simmons drew after a touchdown. For a road win that already carried plenty of weight, it became clear the postgame conversation had to include discipline as much as execution.
Sarkisian made clear he was not brushing it off, especially with Simmons viewed as a potential first-round NFL draft pick and expected to carry himself accordingly. The message was about professionalism and setting a standard moving forward, the kind of correction that can linger long after the scoreboard is forgotten. Tennessee fans may not have liked the result, but they certainly noticed the celebration, and Texas had to answer for it. [Read more 🡒]
Tennessee Just Gave Vols Fans A New Respect Debate
Tennessees narrow 20-17 loss to top-ranked Texas at Neyland Stadium left the Vols with the kind of mixed review that tends to linger. The defense and special teams did enough to keep the game tight, but the offense never fully found its rhythm, and that imbalance showed up again when the latest 247Sports SEC poll landed after Week 4.
Georgia claimed the No. 1 spot, Texas settled in at No. 2 and Tennessee slid to No. 8, a drop that adds another layer to the ongoing respect conversation around the program. Florida and Mississippi State made noticeable climbs, while Texas A&M and Ole Miss also moved down, but for Tennessee the bigger question is how much a close battle with the nations top team actually changes the conference view of the Vols. [Read more 🡒]
Tennessee Gets A Charged Auburn Test After One Ugly Wake-Up Call
Tennessee gets back on the road Saturday, Oct. 3, and the timing of Auburn could hardly be more instructive. Both teams are 3-1, and for Josh Heupels group, the trip comes with a quick chance to reset after the offense sputtered in the loss to Texas, a game that forced the head coach to talk openly about what needs cleaning up.
Champions Weekend adds another layer to the afternoon in Auburn, with Tennessee honoring past championship teams and individuals while the current roster tries to restore some momentum. The Vols do not have much margin for another clunker this early, and this matchup should say plenty about how quickly Heupels offense can respond to the wake-up call it just got. [Read more 🡒]