All for Tennessee
Fansided

The Tennessee Vols Take Care of Business

By Seth Norris

facebooktwitterreddit

The Tennessee Vols football team took care of business in a trap game Saturday against the WCU Catamounts at Neyland Stadium. The Volunteers won 55-10.

The Tennessee Volunteers dominated an outmatched Western Carolina team under the lights inside Neyland Stadium.

The Volunteers (2-1) proved to be too much for the Catamounts (1-2) of the Southern Conference in a 55-10 victory. The Vols outplayed the Catamounts in all three areas of the game, and were able to capitalize on short field opportunities.

“We basically controlled the field position game all night,” said Tennessee coach Butch Jones, “We still have to come away with more touchdowns, but I thought we had some short fields and we capitalized on it.”

More from Tennessee Volunteers

The Vols capitalized on field position early after senior defensive back Cam Sutton forced a Carolina fumble on the fourth play of the game. After a Derek Barnett recovery at Tennessee’s 49-yard line, the Vols made quick work with a five play, 51-yard drive. Freshman wide receiver Preston Williams capped the drive off with a 25-yard touchdown, which was his first reception and touchdown as a Volunteer.

“It’s great to see Preston Williams do some things for us,” said Jones.

After jumping out to a quick 20-0 lead, the second quarter seen the return of LaDarrell McNeil. The senior safety who was recently thought to be lost for the season with a neck injury, intercepted quarterback Troy Mitchell at Tennessee’s 35-yard line. He returned the pick for 57-yards putting the Vols on the eight-yard line.

” It was very exciting. I wasn’t expecting to make a big play or catch any interceptions tonight,” said McNeil, “But when I made the big play it got the sideline hype. It got me hyped. I was jacked.” 

Running back Jalen Hurd capitalized on the turnover and field postion, and rushed the ball in for an eight-yard touchdown putting the Vols up 27-0.

Tennessee totaled twenty-one points off of takeaways.

” It’s everything what you do with the football when you have sudden change,” said Jones “our defense did a great job of being opportunistic of taking the ball away or fielding a position gain with the return game, you have to turn those into seven points.”

The Volunteer’s continued to add to their lead, but now with offense or defense, it came with the third area of the game: special teams.

After a field goal by Western Carolina to make it 34-3, sophomore Evan Berry quickly answered with a touchdown of his own. Berry broke several tackles, and dashed out to an 88-yard touchdown to put the Vols up 41-3 going into halftime.

The second half seen another return for a touchdown, but this time it came with running back Alvin Kamara taking a punt return 50-yards for the first score of the half making it 48-3 Tennessee. This marked the first time since 1950, that the Vols scored on both a kick and punt return.

Running back Alvin Kamara also finished the night with a rushing touchdown making him only the second Vol in history to have a punt return and rushing touchdown in the same game.

Next: Three Things We Learned About the Vols vs. WCU

More from All for Tennessee

Home/Tennessee Volunteers