War Room: Recruiting nuggets, portal chatter, and more
We begin this edition of the War Room as we always do. The War Room is a collective effort of Tennessee notes and news gathered throughout the week by the Volquest staff. And now, it’s on with the news.
For the Tennessee football team, the last few days have been about personal growth as they look to finish out the semester then get a break before summer work starts right after Memorial Day. Classes end on May 7th and exams conclude on May 15th, giving the players a couple of weeks to go home or get away from football before it cranks back up.
At the end of last week, multiple players were in Nashville to visit with various companies as a part of a professional study/workshop if you will to go with obvious networking. On Wednesday this week, VFL’s Ramon Foster of 104.5 the zone in Nashville and Jayson Swain of the Sports Animal visited with the the team to talk about marketing and branding, themes which are obviously of huge importance for athletes in today’s NIL climate.
Players are also continuing to work out while coaches are on the road recruiting.
The news on the transfer portal front has been quiet which is no surprise in terms of adding guys. Aside from possibly adding running back due to injury it has just never felt like the program was going to have a real presence on the recruiting side of the portal.
On the departing side, Elijah Herring is the only scholarship player to go into the portal after spring practice. It won’t be a complete shock if someone else does enter the portal before the window closes next week, but it doesn’t feel like there is going to be any real movement of note at this point.
Both those paragraphs say a lot about where the program is and where the culture Josh Heupel has fostered since his arrival has evolved to. For the last three years playing at Tennessee and for Josh Heupel has been a good experience on and off the field.
Part of that appears to be how Tennessee sells the program in the recruiting process. It seems to be a pretty simple system in that what you see is what you get.
“Everything that I was looking at when I was recruited here is still the same,” Nico Iamaleava said.
It’s pretty obvious he’s not alone in that notion.
Jayson Jenkins did toy with going into the portal this week, but never really pursued it. Jenkins never went to Tennessee’s compliance to request that his name be put into the the portal and we don’t believe he got any more NIL money as result of his flirtation.
The bottom line is that Jenkins will play more football this fall than he will have played to this point in his career. No one at the strong side defensive end spot is a proven established guy so Jenkins is in the best spot he has been in as a Vol when it comes to playing time. Something he apparently reminded himself of Monday night/Tuesday morning.
No former Vol heard their name called Thursday night in the first round of the NFL draft, but all signs point to Jaylen Wright’s name being called at some point on Friday. Wright is a prospect who helped his stock in the draft process with the combine.
His stock as also been helped as people have dove into his film and his history. As a junior in high school, Wright had less than 90 touches. Due to COVID Wright didn’t have a senior season. In three years at Tennessee he had less than 400 touches. So over the last five years, Wright has only had the ball in his hands around 490 times which is not a heavy workload. So an NFL team is not getting a guy who’s beat up which is an aid to his draft stock.
Wright is expected to be the only Vol taken in the first three rounds unless someone takes a flyer on Joe Milton that high in the draft. But most believe Milton is a late round pick on Saturday. Milton made a team visit to see the Cleveland Browns after his pro day workout in Knoxville, but that’s the only visit he has had with an NFL franchise.
Next year, Tennessee should see its name called on Thursday night as all the early draft talk for the 2025 draft includes James Pearce’s name in the top-10.
Recruiting
Tennessee added a big one this week when wide receiver Radarious Jackson committed on Monday. George MacIntyre was thrilled with the news and hung out with Jackson at their 7v7 event last weekend. Jackson is maybe the biggest upside talent on the Vols’ board with him just scratching the surface of what many think he can become.
Another big time talent at receiver that Tennessee has a ton of momentum with is Travis Smith. He and his family have been talking to certain Vol commits and their families along with some uncommitted players who are heavily considering Tennessee. He feels very comfortable with Kelsey Pope and feels like Tennessee has made him a high priority in the class.
The more we talk to people, the more we believe Tennessee is in a tremendous spot with David Sanders as we hit the end of April. There is obviously a long way to go as he will have several more official visits over the course of the next two months, but Tennessee could not be in a better spot than they are in right now in our opinion.
Juan Gaston has gone back and forth on taking an official visit to Tennessee before making a fall decision, but we are told this week the plan is to now take one and the date is being finalized over the next week or so. The Vols continue to remain a serious player here, and they will look to get him and his family back to campus over the summer if they can.
Rodney Garner has kept close tabs on Brandon Caesar since last summer, and it is clear to us the Ohio DL feels strongly about the Vols. His visit with Garner went very well earlier this week, and Tennessee continues to build some momentum here following his spring visit to Rocky Top. He plans to make a decision around the end of the summer currently and will be back to Knoxville in June for an official visit.
Garner also checked in on Damien Shanklin during his three days on the road this week, and the elite EDGE told us the visit went very well. He added that he is excited to get back down to Tennessee in June for an official visit. LSU, Notre Dame, Ohio State and Texas all continue to be prominent players here.
Shanklin has scheduled a September 21st date for a decision, but the more we check into it, we believe that could move forward depending on how he feels coming out of official visits.
Some of you have asked about the tight end position and Tennessee is very comfortable with who they have in Jack Van Dorselaer and likely won’t pursue other tight ends in class. If they do it would only be someone like Dasaahn Brame, who will visit Tennessee in June. Oregon appears to be the biggest competition for him.
Tennessee will look to add another safety or two in this class.
Shady Hayward is the obvious choice for one spot but he also could grow into a linebacker. Alabama safety Tim Merritt and North Carolina safety Jordan Young are also viable options who will visit.
Tennessee offered Aiden Manutai in February, and he has climbed the ranks on their safety board in our opinion. The fast-rising Hawaii standout will be in town for an official visit the weekend of June 7th.
He has heavily researched Tim Banks and the Tennessee secondary, and he has been impressed with what he has learned so far. Manutai has bonded with Banks, and the fact that Tennessee was his first SEC offer means something to him.
He knows he will not see the majority of his contenders more than once, so official visits in June will be important to him, as he hopes to make a decision by the end of July.
Joey Halzle and Glen Elarbee checked on Andrew Babalola on Thursday, and the five-star offensive tackle prospect told us the visit went very well with the Tennessee coaches as he was able to spend time catching up and learning more about them in the process.
He plans to return to Tennessee in June for an official visit as the Vols remain a real factor in his recruitment heading into the summer.
Hoops
It hasn’t been perfect I guess, but it’s been a pretty strong couple of weeks for Tennessee, Rick Barnes and the transfer portal.
Tennessee has hosted four transfers on official visits since the Vols’ season ended.
Tennessee is holding commitments from two of those visitors; Darlinstone Dubar and Felix Okpara and as of this writing we expect a commitment soon from a third, Charlotte transfer Igor Milicic.
The fourth visitor was Belmont transfer Cade Tyson, one of the more coveted shooters in the portal. He made 47% from three last season and is choosing between Tennessee and North Carolina.
Tyson is originally from the Charlotte area and understandably, the allure of playing for the Tar Heels is strong for an in-state guy.
The fact of the matter is on the face of things it would appear that Tyson’s path to playing time and/or role on the team would be easier/bigger in Knoxville. Or at least how big it would be in Chapel Hill is going to have a lot to do with the decision Harrison Ingram makes regarding staying in the NBA draft.
Plenty of people out there think that despite what looks like a log jam for minutes at UNC, Tyson is going to end up picking the home-state team. That may very well be true, and if that’s the case, it won’t be a surprise.
However, the visit has come and gone and Tyson still hasn’t made a decision, or at least an announcement. Tennessee is definitely the underdog here, but the Vols very clearly made a strong impression on the family and gave them a great deal to think about here.
I don’t want to give anyone false hope, because I do think UNC is holding a strong hand here. I just think Tennessee has been deeper in this one than a lot of people think.
Moving on everyone wants to know about the next name.
The biggest potential name floating out there now is North Florida transfer Chaz Lanier who finally ended the suspense and officially entered the transfer portal on Wednesday afternoon.
Lanier averaged 19.7 ppg last season and made 44% from three. Suffice it to say he’s a hot commodity.
He also made the somewhat unusual move of entering the portal with a ‘no contact’ tag, meaning he doesn’t wish to be contacted by college coaches.
Typically that has meant, in our experience, that a player already has his mind made up or at least has a very short list of schools he knows he’s going to be interested in.
Tennessee is going to make an all out push to be a major player here. He’s originally from Nashville, so there is an obvious allure of potentially finishing his college career back home.
But this one, at least in the 24-36 hours after he has entered the portal, feels like it’s going to be a pretty high-flying affair with a lot of interested parties involved.
All of the smoke right now seems to be centered on Tennessee and Maryland, but again, virtually every program in the country is going to want to get involved here, and despite that ‘no contact’ tag, third parties are going to be crawling out of the woodwork to get in Lanier’s ear.
Assuming that in the next few days Tennessee’s transfer haul looks like Dubar, Okpara and Milicic I would expect that the Vols would like to add at least a couple of more specific pieces.
Even if they can’t snag Lanier or someone of that caliber Tennessee would ideally like to add another ball handler to take some pressure off of Zakai Zeigler. Again, ideally, that addition would be a younger player that could gain some experience this year and be ready for a bigger role in 2025-26.
Additionally we think that Tennessee would like to add another banger. Not necessarily even another starting quality big, which would be tough if Okpara and Milicic are joining the roster to go along with JP Estrella and Cade Phillips, but the Vols would like to pick some additional size and another big, physical body.
The smoke still hasn’t settled on the portal and all the activity surrounding it. It’s very possible, even likely l would say, that names will still emerge we haven’t heard yet that Tennessee will get involved with.
It’s been a hectic and productive couple of weeks of portal season already with more yet to come.
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