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Tennessee football: Injury updates, starting QB named ahead of Arkansas

By Caleb Calhoun

Oct 3, 2020; Knoxville, TN, USA; Tennessee head coach Jeremy Pruitt walks down the sideline during a game between Tennessee and Missouri at Neyland Stadium in Knoxville, Tenn. on Saturday, Oct. 3, 2020. Mandatory Credit: Calvin Mattheis-USA TODAY NETWORK
Oct 3, 2020; Knoxville, TN, USA; Tennessee head coach Jeremy Pruitt walks down the sideline during a game between Tennessee and Missouri at Neyland Stadium in Knoxville, Tenn. on Saturday, Oct. 3, 2020. Mandatory Credit: Calvin Mattheis-USA TODAY NETWORK /
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Jeremy Pruitt had more updates on the Tennessee football Volunteers Wednesday.

On Wednesday, Tennessee football head coach Jeremy Pruitt held multiple media sessions. His focus ranged from more key injuries to explaining updates to the depth chart to discussing the pandemic and how it affected the Vols during the bye week.

As Dan Harralson of VolsWire.com noted, UT released its depth chart for the Arkansas Razorbacks on Monday. What stood out was the fact that Jarrett Guarantano is still the starting quarterback with no clear No. 2 guy.

In his press conference on Wednesday, Pruitt said that Guarantano had another good week of practice and insisted that lots of his success and the offensive success in general comes down to all 11 people doing the right thing on a play. Here’s what he said about why he hasn’t named a full-time second-string quarterback among Brian Maurer, J.T. Shrout and Harrison Bailey.

"It’s pretty common in young players, when you talk about consistencies, getting these guys the amount of reps, really, to where you’ve kind of got something to judge them off of. So that’s one thing about having scrimmages, and then having an open week’s been good, especially with Brian (Maurer) and Harrison (Bailey). Their reps were limited when we were kind of in camp mode, so just trying to create, really, a volume of plays to where you can judge exactly where they’re at.”"

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Nobody on Tennessee football’s roster had any positive COVID-19 tests on Wednesday, but according to Patrick Brown of GoVols247, Pruitt said on Wednesday’s SEC Teleconference that multiple players missed Monday’s practice due to false positive tests. He said there is one more test to go for the week, on Thursday. As a result, the Vols aren’t in the clear there yet.

In terms of injuries, Pruitt had more news on that front as well. On the offensive line, Jerome Carvin has been dealing with turf toe and was kept out of practice all last week. However, he added that the junior lineman looked the healthiest since the Missouri Tigers game on Tuesday.

Despite also being asked about Wanya Morris, Pruitt didn’t offer any specifics on anybody beyond Morris. All he said was that everybody else up front is improving and getting healthy. Obviously, injuries up front have been an issue.

Elsewhere, Jeremy Banks was kept out of practice last week but had practiced two days this week as of Wednesday. Pruitt said he suffered an injury against the Kentucky Wildcats but should be ready to see action against the Hogs.

Next. Five Vols to watch for against Arkansas. dark

Taking all this into account, Tennessee football’s bye week appears to have been useful. We can’t be sure about how healthy they are, but if there was no virus outbreak and if players used the time to get healthy and get better, they may be in good position to begin a turnaround after their 2-3 start that has fans everywhere concerned.

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