Tennessee football: Top five performers in 2021 spring game

Offense was the name of the day for Tennessee football in its first spring game under new head coach Josh Heupel. The Orange defeated the White 42-37 with all three scholarship quarterbacks getting time on each team, but the real story was the amount of scoring both teams did. This is all reflected in our list of top performers from the game as well.

Although the defense forced a couple three-and-outs and had one key score, very few defenders stood out. As we get set to rank the players based on what they did in the game, we’ll take into account their combined stat line with each team if they did play on both sides.

Now, take all of this with a grain of salt. Because of how Heupel put players on the field, some of these performances were against lesser competition. However, they still stood out, and whether or not it means anything, they deserve to get some shine for it. Let’s go ahead and give it to them. These are Tennessee football’s top five 2021 spring game performers.

12 carries for 48 yards, 2 TDs

Lots of running backs got touches in the spring game, and the passing game was the story. That should have made it hard for any running back to stand out among Jaylen Wright, Tiyon Evans, Dee Beckwith and Jabari Small, but Small managed to do just that.

While with the White team, he had 11 carries for 45 yards and both of his touchdowns. Although he averaged fewer than five yards a carry on the day, being the only guy to score two touchdowns with the ball in his hands was enough for us to put him on the list. We may not know exactly what to read into that, but it is impressive.

Expectations were cautiously optimistic for Small as he was the one returning significant contributor from last year’s team, having backed up Ty Chandler and Eric Gray, who both transferred. With them gone and him having a solid spring, Tennessee football’s Orange and White game was a great exclamation point for him heading into the summer.