The state of South Carolina has been giving Tennessee football problems over the past month. Less than three weeks after the Vols’ College Football Playoff hopes were dashes with a 63-38 loss to the Gamecocks on the road, they have now lost an elite commitment in their 2024 class from that state.
Mazeo Bennett, a four-star across the board out of Greenville High School in Greenville, S.C., has now decommitted from the Vols. Standing between 5’11” and 6’0″ and weighing in the range of of 165 to 175 pounds, he was committed to the program for just under two months.
In fact, Bennett committed to the Vols a day after they beat the Alabama Crimson Tide, when another receiver from South Carolina, went for five touchdowns and over 200 yards. Bennett announced his decision to decommit from Tennessee football on Twitter.
Put my trust in God. Never failed me pic.twitter.com/tDn4buNmmM
— JEFE (@TheMazeoBennett) December 9, 2022
Make no mistake, this decommitment is a loss. Receivers of his caliber are hard to come by, and there was every reason to believe he could eventually play the role of Hyatt this year. However, while he is a loss, the departure is not alarming.
Normally, when elite prospects like this decommitment, you start to wonder if something internally is wrong with the program. Heupel and the Vols losing to the Gamecocks less than a month ago would raise such red flags here.
Butch Jones’ final class suffered a wave of decommitments for this specific reason. When a program is floundering, players want to jump ship, and they often times know more about what’s happening on the inside than the public does.
If you look at Bennett’s statement, though, that’s clearly not the case. He specifically discussed the changes in the coaching staff. It appears Alex Golesh, who just left his role as Tennessee football’s offensive coordinator to become head coach of the South Florida Bulls, had a huge role in his recruitment.
As a result, this is just one of those random instances where an elite player who committed to an assistant coach is now looking elsewhere because that assistant coach is gone. If that happens a few times, the Vols will be fine, as they will lose more assistants.
Heck, depending on who Heupel brings in as his new offensive coordinator, there’s a chance the Vols win Bennett back. He still has the Vols as one of his top schools, as he mentioned. It just seems like right now, with Golesh gone, he wants to keep things open, and there’s nothing wrong with that or the UT program.
Heupel and Tennessee football already have two four-stars committed for 2024, and given the success he just had, he’ll be able to find some elite receivers for that class. All in all, there’s no reason to panic over this one, but keeping him would obviously have been preferable.