KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – The Tennessee football team returned to practice on Tuesday at Haslam Field in shells after an off day and a lighter workout following the weekend scrimmage.

UT head coach Jeremy Pruitt praised the performance of his experienced offense following practice.

“There was pretty good tempo there on the offensive side today,” Pruitt said. “And, I’m going to say it again, we have more experience on the offense. We have more maturity. When you give them a couple of days off and you go back to work, you would expect them to have little bit of juice about them and the offensive side did.”

Even with the increased tempo that the offense has shown throughout camp, Pruitt can still seek improvement in all phases of the game.

“To me it’s pretty simple,” Pruitt said. “How can we improve in every phase? Assignments – let’s know what to do. It sounds pretty simple, but you would be amazed at how many times people play a play and don’t know what to do. I’m not talking about Tennessee, I’m talking about everywhere. Knowing how to align, whether it’s a wide receiver with a proper split, the location of the running back.”

Offense Returns Production
The offense returns its leading passer in Jarrett Guarantano, rusher in Ty Chandler and receiver in Marquez Callaway from the previous season for the first time since 1996 when Peyton Manning, Jay Graham and Joey Kent all returned. Tennessee also returns 98.5 percent of its receiving and 86.5 percent of its rushing production.

In 2018, Guarantano set a single-season program record with 166 consecutive passes without an interception, finishing with a 4:1 TD-INT ratio.

Freshman Stepping In As Needed 
Freshman Aaron Beasley, who was listed at defensive back, was working with the linebackers on Tuesday. With a “bug” going around, the freshman is stepping up to fit the team’s needs.

“It’s really because we’re thin at the linebacker position,” Pruitt said. “We have a little bit of a bug going around. Aaron is a guy that would play money linebacker as a defensive back as he is going to take some reps there. Daniel Bituli has a sore knee and we’ve kept him out of a couple of practices here and we have to keep practicing even if guys get banged up or sick. We are making do with what we got and he is a guy that could probably play in there. I think he could play safety, we recruited him as a safety. He was a guy in high school who was 220 or 215 pounds and has really worked hard to get down to 205 or 206. I think from practice moving forward, today he works as a third team inside linebacker and a third team safety. I think he has an opportunity to play faster this year possibly in our nickel and sub packages as a linebacker.”

Shamburger Shows Maturity 
Pruitt noted that junior Shawn Shamburger has shown improvement throughout the course of the year on and off the field. He is in the running to be Tennessee’s “star” nickel back.

Shamburger appeared in all 12 games with a pair of starts in 2018, recording 11 tackles and a pair of pass breakups.

“I would say he’s matured on and off the field,” Pruitt said. “He’s worked hard to do that. He’s shown that he can be a little more reliable and dependable. I think he’s got some ability. He’s a good competitor, has good feel for playing inside, so we’ll just continue to work him at STAR and see where that goes. You know, we’re working Alontae (Taylor) in there. Nigel (Warrior) can play there, Theo (Jackson), (Cheyenne) Labruzza, we double train our guys so they all can play multiple spots. We’re just out there right now trying to figure out who’s the best five that give us a chance to win, who’s going to be the sixth guy, who’s going to be the seventh guy, who’s going to be the eighth guy and so on.”

Special Teams Unit Continues to Impress
Pruitt continued his praise for his specialists on Thursday night. In 2018, the punt unit allowed an average of just two yards per return, setting a single-season program record. Most recently, long snapper Riley Lovingood was named to the watch list for the inaugural Patrick Mannelly Award given to the nation’s top long snapper.

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Head Coach Jeremy Pruitt Press Conference Transcript | Aug. 20, 2019

Opening statement:
“There was pretty good tempo there on the offensive side today, and, I’m going to say it again, we have more experience on the offense. We have more maturity. When you give them a couple of days off and you go back to work, you would expect them to have little bit of juice about them and the offensive side did. To me, when I look at the defensive side of the ball, a lot of guys are capable of being good football players. They have yet to do it at the college level, so you’re looking for consistency every day in practice. We’ve got to develop that and learn to push past and show a little bit more mental toughness when we get sudden changes and work through situations like that. Again, I feel like in the last two weeks that our guys in the kicking game have done a nice job – our snappers, holders, punters and kickers. We continue to work with the guys on return game, which is extremely important. We need that to become a weapon for us, with our kickoff return and punt return this year.”

On where he wants to improve:
“To me it’s pretty simple. How can we improve in every phase? Assignments – let’s know what to do. It sounds pretty simple, but you would be amazed at how many times people play a play and don’t know what to do. I’m not talking about Tennessee, I’m talking about everywhere. Knowing how to align, whether it’s a wide receiver with a proper split, the location of the running back. It could be an offensive linemen, is he in the back field too deep or is he too far on the ball? A quarterback, does he have enough depth with his alignment in the gun. Defensively, there are all kinds of issues, obviously, whether it’s a defensive lineman, linebacker, DB. All that’s pretty simple. Then you talk about stance. There’s a defined stance we want everybody in on every play. Where your eyes are supposed to be are key. And then finish. So, there are five things: assignment, alignment, stance, your eyes and how you finish. None of that has to do with ability. Not one bit has to do with ability, and we’ve got to improve in all of those areas. Something that we’re harping on this week.”

On freshman DB Jaylen McCollough:
“Jaylen McCollough was here this spring. He is a guy that has maturity. He’s a tough guy, has instincts. He’s learning a couple of the positions back there. He’s a guy that can do that. Has ball skills. He has things that he needs to improve on, and he knows that, but he’s a guy that comes to work every day. One thing about it, you don’t have to coach effort with him. He gives it most of the time.”

On Kurott Garland begin back at practice:
“The portal, a lot of people look at it as a bad thing. I’m not one that looks at it that way. You’re talking about a young man that comes here as a freshman and had several obstacles to go through physically. He was thinking about possibly transferring, we supported him all the way through and in the end, he decided to come back here. He’s here, we’re excited that he’s here and I think the guy has lots of ability. He didn’t get to go through spring, but he took some reps out there today. He’s got to go through a little bit acclimation here, but we have a plan for him. He’s a guy that I think has lots of upside and has done everything we’ve asked him to do in this program since he’s been here. We’re excited that he’s here and we’ll see how he responds over the next couple of days being back out there.”

On freshman Aaron Beasley practicing with the linebackers and what he has seen from him:
“It’s really because we’re thin at the linebacker position. We have a little bit of a bug going around. Aaron is a guy that would play money linebacker as a defensive back as he is going to take some reps there. Daniel Bituli has a sore knee and we’ve kept him out of a couple of practices here and we have to keep practicing even if guys get banged up or sick. We are making do with what we got and he is a guy that could probably play in there. I think he could play safety, we recruited him as a safety. He was a guy in high school who was 220 or 215 pounds and has really worked hard to get down to 205 or 206. I think from practice moving forward, today he works as a third team inside linebacker and a third team safety. I think he has an opportunity to play faster this year possibly in our nickel and sub packages as a linebacker.”

On handing over the defensive calls to Derrick Ansley and the adjustment to it:
“I don’t think it’s going to be any different than it was before. I’ll hear every call that goes out there and if there is one I don’t like I’ll say call this instead. Why am I the head coach at Tennessee? Probably because I was a good play caller at one time. I think me completely getting out of it wouldn’t be very smart. Derrick has a great feel and I’ve watched him in camp and in spring of what we want to get accomplished, but he’ll do a good job of it and if he needs help I’ll help him.”

On how DB Shawn Shamburger has improved over the last year:
“I would say he’s matured on and off the field. He’s worked hard to do that. He’s shown that he can be a little more reliable and dependable. I think he’s got some ability. He’s a good competitor, has good feel  for playing inside, so we’ll just continue to work him at STAR and see where that goes. You know, we’re working Alontae (Taylor) in there. Nigel (Warrior) can play there, Theo (Jackson), (Cheyenne) Labruzza, we double train our guys so they all can play multiple spots. We’re just out there right now trying to figure out who’s the best five that give us a chance to win, who’s going to be the sixth guy, who’s going to be the seventh guy, who’s going to be the eighth guy and so on.”

On what makes tight ends coach Brian Niedermeyer’s so valuable as a recruiter and coach:
“I think, No. 1, he’s young. He’s not married, so what else does he have to do. It’s not like he’s got a wife to go home to or any kids to go home to, so what does he do? He recruits. He recruits all the time. He builds relationships with the players that we’re recruiting. I think he’s very personable. He’s real. He’s a guy that kind of stays on people and he uses the resources that we have here. I think he does a good job. He’s a good coach, too. A lot of people don’t appreciate how good a coach that he is. He does a really good job. He could coach any side of the ball on defense. That’s what he always was for us was a defensive GA, but he’s a very intelligent guy and it really comes easy to him.”

On if freshman LB Henry To’o To’o has been able to maintain his solid play throughout camp:
“Yeah, I mean Henry has been pretty consistent. We’ve had several young guys that have been really consistent, which is a positive. Maybe it’s maturity, I don’t know what it is, but you see it everywhere. I’ve seen it over the years, and you can’t predict it. It don’t matter who’s got how many stars or where they played at or anything like that. Sometimes when it kind of gets going in fall camp, some guys, they don’t blink and some guys do, but usually they all get it eventually, so he’s picked it up pretty fast.”

On guys that have made plays but are still learning what to do consistently:
“Well I would say most all of the young players. Just from the standpoint that they hadn’t spent the time because they couldn’t, right? Whether it was they weren’t here during the spring, or maybe they were here during the spring, but when you compare it to guys that have age on them and have more experience or that have been in the system longer, that’s usually who it is. Once you’ve been here for a couple of years most everybody understands what you’re trying to do, so they either kind of show up or they don’t. Lots of times it depends on who’s in front of them. I’ve seen years where we were really deep at defensive back and maybe we had a good young player and he didn’t play for the first two years that he was in the program, maybe didn’t play for the first three years, but he played his last two and he’s still playing. So, it wasn’t because he didn’t have an opportunity to be a really good player, maybe the opportunity didn’t present itself. Maybe he wasn’t ready at that time. Could have been because maybe his body wasn’t mature enough yet. There’s lots of things that go into that. We have lots of guys on our team that that have a chance to be really good football players one day and we’ve got to understand that as coaches. I say it all the time, ‘don’t place unrealistic expectations on them.’ My dad has always had a saying, ‘for every freshman you play is a loss that you should have on your record.’ That’s the way he looks at it in high school and if you look at it along the way it’s probably about right.”

On narrowing down the offensive line:
“I think we’ll probably play eight to 10 guys. I really do. I think there are going to be that many guys that deserve to play. I think we’re going to need to play that many guys, so we’ll keep working them that way. It’s good for competition. Nobody’s going to get complacent. Just go out there and work. Whoever performs the best every day will be with the [first string]. It’s a production-based industry, so we just do it that way. Can be a good thing.”

On Aubrey Solomon’s status affecting game-planning:
“We’re not working on a game plan right now, so it wouldn’t matter probably up until Tuesday or Wednesday of next week.”

On the competition between Brian Maurer and J.T. Shrout for the backup quarterback spot:
“Both of these guys flash. It’s been a little bit like a yo-yo, right? One day, one of them has a really good day, and the next day the other one does. Just like lot of young players, they’re looking for consistency. It’s not that they don’t have talent. They’ve got plenty of talent and made a lot of plays in camp. When you play that position, you probably wouldn’t be here if you didn’t have the ability to make plays. It’s about [not] giving the ball to the other team and staying out of negative plays. That’s what we’re kind of looking for there.”

UT Athletics

Tennessee football coach Jeremy Pruitt met with reporters Tuesday afternoon to recap scrimmage #2 and practice the first two days of the week.