Tennessee football vs. UTEP: 10 keys for Vols against Miners

2. Can UTEP generate a running game against the Vols’ questionable front seven?

Because of the questionable awareness of Tennessee football’s inside linebackers and safeties, the UTEP Miners have a chance to catch them out of position on running plays. Add to it the fact that the Vols have been highly inconsistent with the play of their front seven overall, which we didn’t expect going into the year, and you could have a recipe for a defense to get gashed.

Dana Dimel, as we said has everything run through his quarterback, in this case Kai Locksley, to get things going. Locksley leads the team in passing and rushing, but rushing is where UTEP has been able to see some positives through the year so far.

Locksley and Quardraiz Wadley have combined for 298 yards on a total of 43 carries through two games. The system is already making a huge playmaker out of Wadley, who has 139 yards on just 15 carries, averaging nearly nine and a half yards a carry.

Altogether, UTEP has 367 rushing yards on the year. So they have something going in that regard, and they are facing an opponent that has major issues all the way around on defense. Is there a chance that they have just enough to now exploit a match-up advantage?

Tennessee can’t take this attack lightly. The Vols have shown too many issues so far to do that, and they can’t really expect things to change dramatically on Saturday. It’s just too early in the season and not far enough removed from those issues showing themselves. So watch out to see if UTEP can exploit something here that nobody saw coming.