Tennessee football: Top 15 recruits for Vols to pursue in 2021

Back in 2019, Tennessee football made a huge splash when they landed five-star offensive lineman Darnell Wright out of West Virginia. He was their first unanimous five-star since Jonathan Kongbo in 2016, and Kongbo was a junior college transfer. So the Vols had not secured any elite unanimous five-star who was a four-year guy since 2015.

Anyway, Jeremy Pruitt may have been able to establish a pipeline there. Meanwhile, what happens to the West Virginia Mountaineers under Neal Brown, after they went 5-7 in his first season, is completely up in the air. As a result, the Vols should go back to that state for talented guys they can land, and Isaiah Johnson is one of those guys.

A four-star on Rivals, Johnson is the No. 7 ranked cornerback nationally and the top-ranked player in the state. He comes out of Bluefield High School in Bluefield, W. Va., which is right in the center part of the state. At 6’1″ 174 pounds, he obviously has to put on more weight, but he can do that, and his height is great for a cornerback.

There are no Rivals FutureCast predictions yet, and WVU is the favorite on the FanFutureCast to land him by a plurality. But that school isn’t in his top six, and Rocky Top is. If Pruitt gets him, he might truly be able to make UT the top destination for everybody in Appalachia.