KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Gearing up for Saturday’s conference opener and first road game of the 2023 campaign at Florida (7 p.m., ESPN), the 11th-ranked Vols took Haslam Field for practice on a sunny Tuesday morning. After picking up a pair of non-conference wins to start the season, the Big Orange is preparing for a physical matchup in Gainesville, which comes with the territory of competing in the Southeastern Conference.
Linebackers coach Brian Jean-Mary met with members of the media following Tuesday’s practice and had high praise for Florida’s quarterback Graham Mertz, skill players Ricky Pearsall, Montrell Johnson and Trevor Etienne, and the UF offense as a whole.
“(They are) a very well-coached team,” Jean-Mary said. “Big, physical offensive line. They do a lot of things to create mismatches with their scheme. We’re going to have to do a great job – you mentioned communication, you mentioned being assignment sound – we’re going to have to do a great job this week.”
After spelling graduate transfer Keenan Pili due to an injury sustained in the season opener, sophomore linebacker Elijah Herring led the Vols with five tackles against Virginia and made his first start as a Vol in the home opener vs. Austin Peay. The young backer has honed in on his communication skills and eye discipline, and Jean-Mary discussed what Herring is working to improve this week for the conference lidlifter.
“It’s going to be reading his keys, putting his eyes in the right place,” Jean-Mary said. “The big thing with (Florida’s) run game is they have a lot of movement on their offense and that can lead, especially an inexperienced linebacker, to put his eyes in the wrong spot. We got to make sure he’s obviously in tune to what we’re doing on defense and make sure we keep our run gap integrity with all the things that they do, and if he does that, I know he’ll be fine.”
Through the first two weeks of the 2023 campaign, the Vols lead the nation with 11 sacks and rank second in the country with 25 tackles for loss. Tennessee emphasized the pass rush from its front four throughout the offseason, and senior defensive lineman Omari Thomas addressed what has led to the unit’s success so far this fall.
“I would just say working on it every day, continuing to have fun,” Thomas said. “That’s something that Coach (Rodney Garner) preaches to us all the time, is play vertical, play vertical, play vertical. When you play on the other side of the line of scrimmage, it allows good things to happen. That’s just something that we’ve really bought into, and we’re going to continue to buy into. We work our drills every day to make sure we’re playing vertical. And, we’re having fun. You go out there, when you’re having fun and playing for the people that’s next to you, you feel like you can do anything.”
Full transcript from Jean-Mary and tight ends coach Alec Abeln‘s press conferences can be viewed below, along with select quotes from Thomas and redshirt senior defensive back Warren Burrell.
Tennessee Football Press Conference | Sept. 12, 2023
Tight Ends Coach Alec Abeln
On what he’s seen from McCallan Castles and Jacob Warren…
“I’m happy with where those guys have started. There’s a lot to improve on, but the guys have played hard and made plays when they’ve come their way. I think it’s just the beginning of what they’re capable of. I do think that they’ve done a good job up to this point.”
On what stands out about Florida’s defense…
“They’re good up front, they’re good on the backend and they’ve got good players. Structure wise, they do a couple of things that give you some decisions to make. On third downs they’re really multiple, do a good job presenting that package and they really make you work to earn it.”
On how well he feels the team has executed their run game…
“Execution wise, there’s always another step to it, there’s always another level of how you finish. There’s another level to what your hat leverage is and how hard you really play. I do feel the effort and strain has been good. I feel like there’s still tons of meat on the bone in terms of everything, not just the rushing. But so far there’s a good start. I think there’s still a lot more.”
On McCallan Castles’ ability to make plays after the catch….
“One hundred percent. He’s athletic, he’s explosive and he stepped out of one on Saturday that he got brought down on the first week, which was great to see. One hundred percent expect that for him.”
On his OL experience benefiting McCallan Castles’ understanding of blocking…
“As far as him being willing and hungry for knowledge, it’s a credit to him and the work that he’s put into it. There are some things with my background that naturally make a lot of sense to me, that when you hear it for the first time maybe changes how you view certain blocks or certain techniques. It’s really just a credit to him. Just the work that he’s put in to become more comfortable with that. If you ask him, going back to the spring, a lot of the stuff that he looks pretty solid at right now, you’d be scratching your head saying, ‘man, I don’t know if he’s going to figure it out come this fall’. But it’s been a work and a really intentional mindset from him to get better.”
On McCallan Castles’ confidence after his first touchdown as a Vol…
“He’s got every reason to be confident and if you’re waiting for the big play to have confidence you’re probably waiting a little too long. It was awesome for him to go get that done and get to be there with his family and get to experience what that’s like. Hopefully it’s just the beginning for him, but as far as how it changes things, it really shouldn’t.”
On what he’s seen from Jacob Warren as a run blocker…
“He ain’t scared of nothing. He’s been really intentional about working to fix and improve on some of those areas. I think some of it’s a mindset of just being willing to go strain and be physical. But there’s so much technique to it that I think he’s really embraced and come a long way. Obviously, there’s still more to go but it’s been really good so far.”
On what he means by ‘there’s more meat on the bones’ for the tight ends…
“Just little things. It’s, ‘I get my guy covered up but he wipes across my face late’ or ‘I do a good job getting to the spot on the perimeter but my body position’s not great and instead of me going and burying the guy, I end up kind of on a half.’ It’s a little detail on a lot of things. The same thing with the route. It’s being really clean at the top, dropping my weight, being super efficient and me being just a half a step quicker or half a step more separation and that being the end of it.”
On Jason Witten being at the game on Saturday…
“It was really cool to see him there. I got to talk to him for a couple of minutes during pregame. What he’s done, not just here, but at the professional level, he’s one of the best to ever do it and it was really cool to have him on the field pregame. I do hope we get to connect a little bit more as we go forward.”
On the communication between the tight ends and offensive line…
“It’s one team, one heartbeat on a lot of fronts. I think for us, we’ve got to be an extension of the offensive line and it’s something that with the way we play and the environments we play in in terms of crowd noise and volume and just the overall chaos, you’re not always getting a call. You’ve got to be able to understand the structure as if you are the center making the call. That’s something that we’ve done a pretty good job of. There were times Saturday that we ended up a little bit grey here or there and could’ve made a different decision, but for the most part we’ve been pretty solid as far as being on the same page as the o-line.”
On the progression of Ethan Davis and what the next step for him is…
“He’s done a great job and I think he’s absolutely given himself a chance to play. We obviously want to play him more and I do think in situations where you can do that, he’ll be ready to answer the bell. He’s come a long way from the spring, even where he was at the beginning of training camp. He’s got to continue to take steps every week in practice, but he’s absolutely on the right track.”
On if there are any changes to playing against Florida’s defense from last season…
“We’ll find out. It’s always interesting when you sit down on Sunday and start watching guys and think, ‘okay, does this make sense for what we’ll see or not?’ In the family of Pete Golding, Ron Roberts and all those guys are kind of in the same tree but there’s different twists and some of that’s the different personality of the coordinator, some of that’s different people and different defenses. I do think they’ll have a great plan and we’ll have to go answer the bell.”
Linebackers Coach Brian Jean-Mary
On Aaron Beasley’s first two weeks of the season…
“It’s a continuation for the way he ended the season. I think I said this several times, when you go back and watch the tape of last year, he was the most consistent linebacker that we had whether he came off the bench or started. The confidence that he built off of last year carried over through the spring and then the summer. He’s playing the way we expect him to.”
On Jeremiah Telander’s performance on Saturday…
“He’s a max effort, going to run through a wall, plays with a lot of intensity, and he brought that to the table in the limited reps that he had. I think he hit the ball five times in the second half. Just little things as far as being in the right place in pass coverage. He really could have helped us on the one long pass on third down that they completed into the boundary. But all in all, we were impressed with his effort which is what you expect from him. But he hit the ball, he tried to play fast and physical which is a calling card for him. He got his first college game out of the way, and I think that the best is yet to come.”
On the depth of the linebacker position and a response to Elijah Herring’s and Arion Carter’s performance…
“Those are young, talented players. We rotate a lot, so they get the practice reps. We hope that because of the way that we rotate, those guys are ready to step in because you never know what’s going to happen. Elijah, I felt like was ready to step up. Keenan (Pili) went through about half a spring so he was able to get a bunch of first team reps in the spring. We always coach them to say you’re one play away from being the starter or going from a third teamer to a second teamer and that mentality really came out last week. I thought Elijah did a great job. He got two wicked shots early in the first quarter that I didn’t know how he would bounce back from, and he came back. I thought he played very, very well. Arion, as a freshman, the maturity like we’ve talked about before is that of a junior or a senior. He’s gotten better every week, but obviously the stakes a little higher this week with his first SEC game, so we expect him to keep progressing. The plays that he does make when he’s out there are very good. We just have to eliminate the mistakes.”
On Elijah Herring’s communication skills and his responsibility of making sure the defense is on the same page…
“That’s the MIKE linebacker’s responsibility is to be the take charge guy. Obviously having a veteran like Aaron Beasley there really helps him. I thought the communication was good, probably never great, especially with some of the different formations that Austin Peay lined up in. They really test your communication and your ability to get lined up from the front end to the back end. I thought he did a good job. Obviously, he could have been better, but for the most part it didn’t hurt us, but we really want him to be a lot more vocal this week and make sure we are all on the same page.”
On if any of the new guys surprised him on Saturday…
“No, it would take a lot to surprise me. My expectations are high, and I always tell them that I want their expectations to be higher than mine. If they don’t go into a game ready to play 75 snaps and start and go out there and compete on a high level, I’d be highly disappointed. The only surprise I would say is how physical they were going to be. We always say it, you can’t really practice it during the week. We were a couple weeks removed from our last scrimmage so some of those guys didn’t get a lot reps versus Virginia. I thought for the most part, those guys really tried to play physical, because I think the speed and the intensity part and the assignment part, I really expect them to be as ready as a starter would be. But then the physicality of it, you want to make sure that they match it or can exceed what your expectation would be and I thought they did a good job there.”
On what he’s seen from Florida’s offense…
“Florida (is) very, very talented. We always start with the quarterback. I think Graham Mertz – I had a chance to see when I was at the last job I was at – and I know he’s a super talented kid. Really, really good arm. Really, really good pocket presence. I know he was a highly recruited kid coming out of high school. (He) shows the poise and shows the pocket presence of a big-time quarterback. We’re going to have to do a great job with him. And the thing that I think he’s done in the first two games is he’s shown the ability to pick up yards with his legs, which I know he’s not known for, so that adds an extra element to him. And then, (Florida has) obviously the best backfield we would have seen to this point with Montrell Johnson and Trevor Etienne. I think those guys are really the guys that make their offense go. We have to do a great job stopping the run and controlling those guys. They’re two very, very talented running backs that I think their offense feeds off of. Wideout wise, I think Ricky Pearsall is one of the best wideouts in the SEC right now. He does it all for them. You line him up all over the field, he makes the tough catches and the tough plays. We’re going to have to know where he is on every play. But a very well-coached team. Big, physical offensive line. They do a lot of things to create mismatches with their scheme. We’re going to have to do a great job – you mentioned communication, you mentioned being assignment sound – we’re going to have to do a great job this week.”
On the key to Elijah Herring taking the next step and being successful against Florida…
“It’s going to be reading his keys, putting his eyes in the right place. The big thing with their run game is they have a lot of movement on their offense and that can lead, especially an inexperienced linebacker, to put his eyes in the wrong spot. We got to make sure he’s obviously in tune to what we’re doing on defense and make sure we keep our run gap integrity with all the things that they do, and if he does that, I know he’ll be fine.”
On the temptation to scale back the linebacker rotation this week…
“The great part about our system is the guys that practice the right way, they’re going to play. We’re not going to rotate just to put a body in there. If I ever put a guy in there and I don’t think he can help us win the game, then that’s shame on me. Those guys earn their right through practice to go out there in the game, and when they’re out there, we look at them as starters. If they don’t practice the right way that week and they haven’t been playing at a high level, they’re not going to play. The rotation starts because we feel like we have four or five guys that practice at a high level and can be starters. We don’t expect a drop off when we put guys in the game and if we did, I’d be doing everybody a disservice and I wouldn’t do that.”
On what he saw on film from the Austin Peay game and what adjustments they will make for Florida…
“The quarterback got out on us a couple times and it was missed fits. We had two guys in the same gap, didn’t get our leverage on a couple plays with eyes in the wrong spot. They were all correctable mistakes that we wouldn’t expect to make, and they were able to take advantage a couple times. A couple times on the fourth downs with the quarterback, but we feel like we got it corrected. I would expect to see something similar to what Austin Peay did this week, so we made our corrections and everybody on the field kind of understood where the mistakes were, so we feel like we can move on from them. But they did get us a couple times with leverage, but it wasn’t because of the call, it was because we had guys a couple times that didn’t have their eyes in the right spot or kind of fit in the wrong gap.”
On how involved Keenan Pili has been with the linebackers room since his injury…
“Very. One of the things that he always brought to the table was that leadership aspect. Once he was cleared to come back, he’s been in every meeting. Obviously, he traveled with us, he’s going to travel with us down to Gainesville. He’s an integral part of what we do. It wasn’t just the physical ability, it was his mental capacity to help everybody in the room because of his experience and that’s just carrying over and probably holds a little bit more weight in the room now because he’s seeing it from the sidelines. Most of those guys, when they’re in the room, gravitate to him. And even now, during practice he’s on the sideline. The guys that are not in, they’re down there talking to him and (Kwauze) Pakk Garland. Those guys are like second coaches on the field now.”
On what he’s since from Elijah Herring’s game that he has picked up from Keenan Pili…
“Yes. They’re both bigger, stronger guys. They’re both 230-pund plus linebackers, so you expect the physicality that Keenan brought. Obviously, Keenan was a little bit more seasoned because he had played a lot more football. Elijah is still learning, per se, but there is some similarities in their game. You just see the inexperience at times with Elijah, but that’s gotten so much better. I think getting that first start out of the way, he’s going to be even better this week.”
Senior DL Omari Thomas
On the interior and exterior pass rush complementing each other…
“We all just work together. I want to say in the game this past weekend, (James Pearce Jr.) had a sack from a really good speed to power on a tackle. If you look at it, it just comes from the inside guys creating that push in the pocket, so that way their quarterback is not allowed to step up. It’s just all of us working together to be one. Those guys are doing a great job on their rabbits package, and we’re just doing a great job getting to third down, so that those guys are able to create havoc.”
On what has led to Tennessee leading the nation in tackles for loss…
“I would just say working on it every day, continuing to have fun. That’s something that Coach (Rodney Garner) preaches to us all the time, is play vertical, play vertical, play vertical. When you play on the other side of the line of scrimmage, it allows good things to happen. That’s just something that we’ve really bought into, and we’re going to continue to buy into. We work our drills every day to make sure we’re playing vertical. And, we’re having fun. You go out there, when you’re having fun and playing for the people that’s next to you, you feel like you can do anything.”
On if a players-only meeting occurred on Sunday and what was said…
“We did have one. We just talked about how we just have to continue to approach the week. We can’t change our preparation. We know it’s a big game, first SEC game of the year, it’s a rivalry game. We just don’t need to change what we do. We approach the day like we do any other day, and just come in, have fun (and be) ready to work. That was really the main thing, just continuing to grow together. You have that players meeting, and it was a great meeting for us honestly, just because it allowed everybody to all see that we’re all still on the same page. Flush the game that happened, and let’s continue to go work this week.”
RS-Senior DB Warren Burrell
On competing against Florida’s offense…
“They have a good squad over there. Couple of experienced guys, they’ve got a couple young and explosive guys, mostly speaking about their wide receiver room. They’re a good team. In the SEC, everywhere you go you’re going to play real big-boy football, so they’re not a team we are taking lightly. We go about our process every single day and play our game.”
On what he tells his teammates to expect playing at Florida…
“An SEC away game, anywhere you go, it’s a hostile environment. Everybody knows that you’re playing to get beat, everybody in those stands is rooting for something bad to happen. It’s about whenever you go into those other environments, it’s about mentally staying where you are, locking in on what you practiced and what you worked on. We’ve worked on these things and repped thousands of times at practice. Don’t get out of the game plan, just keep your head in it, and play your game.”
On his fumble recovery vs. Austin Peay and the “rugby” style of punting…
“I think it all works because we have the best punter in the country. Jackson Ross man, that guy is crazy. He can put the ball anywhere. I know y’all hear (Mike Ekeler) talk about him, and he’s not joking. It’s all him man. He puts it in a great spot, and we do what we’re taught to do, and good things happen when you do what you’re supposed to do.”