Tennessee football week 3 stock report: Vols suffering on line of scrimmage

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Special teams as a whole

Yes, Marquez Callaway had a very bad day returning punts. But that seems like an anomaly, so it’s going to get significantly better as time goes on. Then you have the rest of special teams for Tennessee football. Joe Doyle and Brent Cimaglia are coming on. Cimaglia nailed a 38-yard field goal Saturday, and it’s only a matter of time before he starts hitting 40-yarders.

Doyle is getting more consistent in pinning punts inside the 20-yard line, and that’s a huge deal as conference play begins. Given the fact that it’s his first year starting, he’s only going to get better. Meanwhile, on kickoffs, Paxton Brooks is nailing almost everything into the end zone for touchbacks to prevent returns. So kicking itself is looking pretty good, and returning is likely to get better. That makes special teams overall trending up.

Tyson Helton’s play-calling

There have been legitimate questions about this through three games. Tyson Helton has kept the harness on Jarrett Guarantano, looking for him to be a game-manager. It’s made people wonder if that USC and Western Kentucky offense will ever make its way to Rocky Top. But to be fair, Helton appears to be holding out on what he can really do.

We saw his offensive philosophy when he ran the Hilltoppers. And we saw what he could do with quarterbacks when he coached Sam Darnold. Look at the Trojans now without him. At some point, he’s going to really open up and show what his system can do, and with SEC play set to start, that’s likely to be sooner rather than later.