Tennessee football begins 2019 with lots of expectations at wide receiver. Here is our take on what the Volunteers are looking like at the position.
After claiming to have stolen the title of Wide Receiver U, the Clemson Tigers won two national championships in three years under Dabo Swinney. Face it. They’ve stolen that title from Tennessee football at this point.
Actually, dating back to when the Vols began earning the title of Wide Receiver U, Clemson has three national championships to UT’s one. So the Vols have a lot of work to do to regain their reputation here.
Jeremy Pruitt took a step forward towards doing that this offseason by bringing in legendary UT national champion Tee Martin from the USC Trojans to coach wide receivers and Jim Chaney back from the Georgia Bulldogs to be offensive coordinator. Both have a history of producing talent at the position.
During Tennessee football’s 2012 season, Chaney’s last year on Rocky Top, the Vols churned out Cordarrelle Patterson and Justin Hunter. They also had Da’Rick Rogers, Denarius Moore under Chaney.
Meanwhile, Martin has produced Nelson Agholor, Deontay Burnett, Randall Cobb, Marqise Lee, Steven Mitchell Jr., JuJu Smith-Schuster, Isaac Whitney and Robert Woods. So these two guys have a history of maximizing receiver talent.
This year, with everybody returning from last year at receiver, expectations are high for the unit. Vols fans expect them to help Jarrett Guarantano put up significantly high numbers. But how realistic is that?
In this preview, we’re going to take a look at that question. This post analyzes the impact of all the returning starters and what they mean to the university along with what other guys could bring. UT is much healthier at receiver this year, and they showed flashes last year.
What does the increased experience mean for this season? Well, it’s time to break that down. We’ll do what we usually do with a look at the starters, backups, biggest questions and final take. So let’s go ahead and continue our Tennessee football 2019 preview by looking at wide receivers.