Tennessee football OL Darnell Wright returning; Does he know something?

It’s been a brutal couple of months for Tennessee football, but the bottom fell out last week when Henry To’o To’o, Eric Gray and Quavaris Crouch all entered the transfer portal in one day after Jeremy Pruitt was fired. Wanya Morris and Key Lawrence transferring and landing with the Oklahoma Sooners were two other things to happen within the past week.

However, all those moves outside of Lawrence’s transfer took place before the hire of Danny White as athletic director. Now, four days after that hire, a key offensive lineman has decided to return to UT, providing Rocky Top a huge boost.

Darnell Wright, a five-star from West Virginia in Tennessee football’s 2019 class, announced his decision to return for 2020. Wright was part of the same class as To’o To’o, Morris, Gray and Couch. He revealed the news on his Instagram account and on Twitter.

Standing at 6’6″ 330 pounds, the product of Huntington High School in Huntington, W. Va. was supposed to anchor the tackle position with Morris for the future, and he started almost every game at right tackle in 2019, earning Freshman All-SEC honors. However, 2020 was a down year for him and so many other people.

That could have lent itself to Wright transferring. Why, then, would he make the decision to stay now? It makes sense if he announced that while Pruitt was still there or if he announced the transfer before or after the firing of Pruitt.

Deciding to stay after the firing of Pruitt and hiring of White, however, suggests that Wright may be privy to something related to the coaching search that nobody else is. This search has been uniquely quiet, but we know that White met with the players before he embarked on it.

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As a result, Wright could be excited about what he believes to be the future of the program. Lawrence’s departure may offset that a bit, but again, he made that decision on Friday and didn’t show flashes the way Wright did. Very few recruits had the same hype Wright had arriving on campus during the Pruitt era.

From a football perspective, Wright’s return certainly helps to offset some of the bleeding. It’s fair to say that he hasn’t lived up to his potential yet, but he wasn’t an early enrollee in 2019 and COVID shortened everything for everybody in 2020, so he hasn’t had a full offseason to learn any system at this level just yet. He did play in all 10 games in 2020 too, so he’s more durable.

Given the losses of Trey Smith and likely Brandon Kennedy in addition to Morris’ departure, Wright can help keep stability on the line on the outside. Cade Mays coming back gives the new head coach something to work with up front. Jerome Carvin, K’Rojhn Calbert and Cooper Mays are likely to be back as well.

Simply put, Wright’s decision to return is good news for Tennessee football in more than one way. It could signal that a good hire is truly coming to the program, but it also will just give any new coach a bit more to work with next year.