Tennessee lost several key players exiting Josh Heupel’s second season on Rocky Top. The Vols lost their starting quarterback, two starting wide receivers, two veteran offensive linemen, a starting safety, a starting linebacker, and more.
While Tennessee’s staff does feel confident in their ability to replace those pieces with either veteran players or younger pieces that have been waiting for their chance, the inevitability of losing the starters that Tennessee did means that open competitions will fill the offseason and fall camp.
Heupel mentioned both groups during his first answer of Tennessee Media Day on Tuesday afternoon in Knoxville.
“We’re close to 85 (scholarship players),” Heupel said. “We’ve got real depth, real competition, really at every position. And that’s true. Our veterans are here. There are a lot of young guys, 18 of them that were with us during the course of spring ball. I expect them to be much more mature and complete players.”
Over the span of his 20-plus minute press conference to open up the Vols’ fall camp slate, Heupel referenced several of the position groups that will be locked into some sort of competition this fall. Here’s a look at the position battles that Heupel referred to on Tuesday.
“Every position in our program, you gotta go earn it here during the next two and a half, three weeks of training camp,” Heupel said. “Prove that you’re gonna play at a championship level.”
More from RTI: Projecting Tennessee Football’s Depth Chart Ahead Of Fall Camp
Defensive Back’s Room
“It’s one of the positions where there’s great competition.” – Heupel
“We need them to compete and get those reps. You can’t be the player that you need to be if you’re not practicing during this time of year. So we need all those guys playing, competing here during the course training camp for them to be their best.” – Heupel
Heupel referred to five newcomers that came in during January and have really impressed and improved throughout the course of the summer. Those five players include safety John Slaughter, cornerback Jordan Matthews, cornerback Rickey Gibson, cornerback Cristian Conyer, and safety Jack Luttrell. Tennessee does have a number of veteran players, though, including Wesley Walker, Jaylen McCollough, Doneiko Slaughter, and Kamal Hadden.
The Vols’ DB room was beaten up constantly via injury throughout the year, forcing the coaching staff to plug-and-play more often than they would have liked. The Vols do have bolstered depth now and will have the chance to see an entire healthy room in action this fall in order to properly assess the competition.
Offensive Line’s Room
“We got multiple guys that will compete for that (starting spot). Some young guys in our program are also those that’s been here for a while. And that’s one of the things, just personnel wise that we gotta figure out here as we get to the next couple of weeks.” – Heupel
“And whenever you have that kind of opening, that open competition man, it just makes for practice to be intense and physical and it really brings the best for the whole iron sharpens iron. Because whenever those true open spots like guys go, they’re trying to get ’em. So it, it makes for a great camp when we have those situations out there.” – OC Joey Halzle
Tennessee and OL coach Glen Elarbee have the difficult task of replacing veteran linemen Darnell Wright (10th overall NFL pick) and Jerome Carvin from the powerful 2022 line. The Vols did bring in multiple pieces from the transfer portal including John Campbell and Andrej Karic but also have underclassmen such as Addison Nichols potentially in line for an opportunity.
With the objective of filling two starting spots on the line, Tennessee’s offensive line group will certainly be one to watch throughout the fall camp slate. Much of Tennessee’s offensive success last season was bolstered by the Vols’ ability to protect Hendon Hooker and create lanes for the running backs.
Defensive Line’s Room
“One of the position groups, just to date back to my earlier comments, about real depth, real competition, length, athleticism, some of the traits that we’re looking for off the edge and some of that inside too with some of the guys that we’ve brought in.” – Heupel
“Right now, this time of year, you gotta show that you can master what we’re doing. You can go take the job. It’s your job to prove that you’re gonna play at a championship level. And once that happens, then we gotta find a role for those guys. Anticipate those guys doing that during the course of training camp.” – Heupel
With star EDGE rusher Byron Young now in the NFL, one of the Vols’ top tasks of fall camp will be to find out which combination of players are going to be able to attack the quarterback most consistently. Ideally, Tennessee would like to live in a world where they can pressure the quarterback with just four players. With that sort of mindset, the Vols and DL coach Rodney Garner are going to have to use their pieces wisely, which often involves some sort of open competition.
Tennessee returns Omari Thomas, Kurott Garland, and Tyler Baron as three veterans on the defensive line. Tennessee DC Tim Banks raved about the work of Omarr Norman-Lott in both the pass rush and the run-stopping game on Tuesday, which potentially points to the former Arizona State transfer finding consistent playing time.
Back to Young, though, the Vols will look for a replacement with veteran Roman Harrison, sophomore Josh Josephs, and sophomore James Pearce Jr. It will not only be fascinating but also important to see how Tennessee handles the rotation between those three guys at the LEO position.
