Tennessee football’s top five juniors for 2020

Hometown: Knoxville, Tenn.

This is assuming the SEC ruling follows the NCAA ruling. On Thursday, Cade Mays won his appeal to the NCAA for his eligibility waiver, and the Georgia Bulldogs transfer will immediately be able to start for Tennessee football. That ruling actually kept a couple of other offensive lineman off this list who could have made it, including K’Rojhn Calbert and Jerome Carvin.

Both will likely play less now with Mays being able to jump in. Heck, in terms of raw numbers, it kept non-linemen off too, as Princeton Fant and Paxton Brooks could have made a case. Anyway, the legacy player and product of Knoxville Catholic High School is back where he belongs, where his father Kevin Mays played in the 1990s and where his brother Cooper Mays just arrived.

Once a five-star recruit, Mays was a Freshman All-SEC blocker for UGA in 2018, and he proved himself to be one of the most versatile lineman down in Athens. With four other positions set, Mays will likely immediately step in at guard and start alongside Trey Smith. Those two and Brandon Kennedy could help create the best interior line in the nation.

Of course, Mays could be part of a rotation with Carvin, Calbert and Riley Locklear. That combined with his lack of proven production at UT specifically and the slight question on the SEC ruling is why we don’t have him one spot higher. However, him being back gives Will Friend another major option at the position and one of the best.