War Room — Football staff set, recruiting offers, hoops home stretch, baseball
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.
Tennessee is two weeks away from the start of spring practice and Josh Heupel’s staff is set. Heupel could add another analyst, but otherwise things are set with his coaches following the formal announcement of coach Chop to outside linebackers along with the promotion of Evan Crabtree and the hiring of special teams analyst John Bonamengo.
Coach Chop is on a two year deal that will see him make 350k in 2025 and that goes to 375k in 2026. Crabtree, with a coordinator title, gets a three year deal that starts at 225k and increases by 25k every year meaning he will make 275k in the third year of his deal.
With the staff in place, the question now is will there be any adjustments to the length of contracts for coaches who were not on expiring deals last year but are this year? That includes the entire offensive staff, William Inge and Rodney Garner. We think there will be some rollovers, but how many is unknown right now and there’s no timetable on any possible extensions for returning coaches, including head coach Josh Heupel, whose current deal runs through the 2028 season.
Tennessee’s assistants’ salary pay (counting Crabtree, but no other analysts) will be $8.26 million.
As for the current team, they continue their workouts in preparation for spring practice in 14 days. It will be interesting to see who is limited and who is out for the spring due to off-season procedures. This team will not be at full strength this spring and no team in college football ever is. Athletically observers say there is a lot to like about the way this team looks. Now. how does that translate into football? That’s what we all want to see in two weeks.
The word on this team is that they are putting in the work and guys like Joshua Josephs are growing as leaders. There will certainly be plenty of story lines to follow this spring and we will have much more on that in the coming days leading up to spring practice.
Now the question big picture wise is what is the future of spring practice? Schools around the country are ending their spring games. Tennessee is scheduled to have one this year, but you can bet schools in 2026 will follow teams like Texas and Southern Cal in eliminating the game.
But that’s not the biggest question. The biggest question is will spring ball altogether go away and shift to OTA type work in the month of June. That’s what some are pushing for. It would allow a longer time for injured players to heal and not miss as much of the work. It does create a problem with any OTA injury and it might limit some of the push to be a mid-term enrollee. It would give some relief to the tight calendar. We will see if that movement ever becomes real. The movement that is real is the elimination of spring games.
While spring games are a topic of discussion, the biggest topics this week have been expanded playoffs and scheduling as the SEC and Big 10 ADs got together on Wednesday. SEC ADs met just about SEC things on Monday and Tuesday. The calendar is obviously a topic along with number of conference games and a possible Big 10-SEC Challenge.
Possibly doing a challenge like that would certainly make money and would ease the task of trying to schedule home-and-home series. After Indiana played a lighter schedule and got into the playoffs, the question of how beneficial is it to play a big time home and home series is legit.
For the fans and for TV ratings it’s important. Doing a challenge between two conferences would somewhat level the strength of schedule component. It will be interesting to see what schedule movement there is moving forward.
Recruiting
2026 Ohio offensive lineman Sam Greer visited Knoxville at the end of July and returned late last fall for a game-day visit. Greer told us earlier this week that he plans to return to Knoxville in the spring to check out and practice and is working to lock in an OV date to Tennessee, as they continue to remain a factor for the four-star prospect. He has continued to pick up interest from multiple top programs in recent months.
Florida offensive lineman Grant Wise enjoyed his January trip to Knoxville, and while there still seems to be plenty of runway left in his recruitment, it is clear Tennessee has made a nice impression on the four-star. We would not be surprised to see him back in the spring, and he tells us he has locked in an official visit date to Rocky Top for the summer, but he is waiting to confirm some other dates before announcing them all at once.
Tennessee offered 2026 defensive lineman Emanuel Ruffin in January, and his stock is continuing to rise. He is in the process of locking in official visits and confirming dates, and he tells us Tennessee is in line to get one from him at this time. Alabama and Florida are two other schools on the schedule. He has also picked up offers from Georgia, LSU, Ole Miss, and Texas in the last two months. He has a long-standing relationship with Coach Chop and left his time in January highly impressed with Rocky Top. He plans to return to Knoxville in the spring.
Four-star Peach State safety Jordan Smith is one that Tennessee has continued to get to campus. The Vols are a strong contender in this race heading into the spring. There is a possibility he will return again in the spring, but he has already locked in his OV to Rocky Top. Tennessee will host him the weekend of June 20th. This will be his last OV of the month, after he trips to Georgia, Georgia Tech, and Florida State, in that order.
Tennessee linebacker commitment Braylon Outlaw has seen an increase in interest since his junior season ended as well. Ole Miss is one school showing him a lot of attention, and he recently took a trip to Oxford. The Rebels are a factor and other schools are working to be involved. He is planning to see both schools in the spring and in June for an official visit. Florida State is working to get him to campus as well.
He tells us that Tennessee’s consistency has been key, especially since he committed in November, and this is why he feels like they will be hard to beat in the end.
Elsewhere, Tennessee is in line to get an official visit from Louisiana defender Julian Burns. He reports a strong relationship with Tim Banks, and after visiting last fall for the Kentucky game, he has continued to feel like the Vols are one of the programs making him a priority. He likes the idea of being able to play various spots in Tennessee’s defense.
Oak Ridge 2027 TE Malik Howard continues to see more interest. Tennessee offered him last summer and it certainly looks like a good early offer. He has put on a ton of muscle and looks really good after we saw him a few weeks ago at a junior day. He picked up Alabama, South Carolina and Duke offers this past week.
Speaking of tight ends, Mater Dei tight end Mark Bowman plans on visiting this spring after reclassifying from the 2027 class. Tennessee is obviously locked in with Carson Sneed but when someone like Bowman wants to take a look, you gladly host them.
Tennessee’s all in on Pennsylvania defensive back Joey O’Brien. Obviously Penn State is heavily involved but he has been very outgoing in reaching out to Tennessee. He is going to take an official visit in June and plans on visiting for spring practice.
Defensive lineman Luke Wafle is someone Tennessee is working to get here for an official visit this June. Tennessee saw him twice back in January and they are working to get him in for a visit this spring,
Hoops
Tennessee is coming down the homestretch of a difficult close to the SEC season, but not in comparison to what some in the league are facing in the final two weeks.
Road trips to Texas A&M and Ole Miss and a home date with Alabama won’t be picnics. But the Vols have caught a little bit of a break by catching LSU and South Carolina, the two worst teams in the league, in the last two weeks of the season.
For fans, trying to get a handle on this team has been tough.
Are they a legit one or two seed in the upcoming NCAA Tournament? Or are they a gritty band of overachievers that can only beat top teams on nights when they execute their defensive game plan flawlessly?
Tennessee gave each viewpoint plenty of ammunition the last time out against Vandy with a brutal first half followed by a brilliant second.
Regardless of your personal opinion, with five games left in the regular season Rick Barnes and his squad are still in the conversation for the first No. 1 seed in program history.
It’s anyone’s guess what Tennessee will need to do in the final five games to best position itself for a one seed. However, it seems safe to say that a split with Texas A&M and Ole Miss, taking care of Bama at home and handling business against the SEC bottom feeders would be a great start.
The split on the road is obviously the toughest part of that equation, starting at College Station this weekend where it always seems the Vols have a tough time.
Carrying over the second half offense over from Vanderbilt, where the Vols scored 50 points and shot 65%, is obviously a goal this weekend.
Zakai Zeigler was fabulous in that second half comeback and his personal match-up with Texas A&M’s Wade Taylor will be a key one on Saturday.
It’s becoming more and more imperative for Tennessee that Chaz Lanier show up against good teams and produce. That’s been abundantly obvious in conference play where Lanier is averaging 17.3 ppg in the Vols’ eight wins and 12.4 ppg in their five losses.
Keep an eye on the rebounding battle tomorrow. Texas A&M leads the league in rebounding (+9.2 per game) and it’s a huge part of what makes them successful.
The Aggies are the worst shooting team in the league, which should play into Tennessee’s hands, so limiting second chance opportunities is going to be huge.
On the recruiting front there’s no hard information out there about Nate Ament, but the feeling is that Tennessee is fading for the top-ranked unsigned prospect in the class.
Ament hasn’t publicly eliminated Tennessee, or anyone else for that matter, but following his most recent official visit to Kentucky (where he saw the Vols play) the buzz out there suggests that Duke, Kentucky and Louisville have separated themselves from the pack a bit.
That’s speculation on our part, but that’s the way the wind seems to be blowing at the moment.
Tennessee continues its pursuit of four-star point guard Chance Mallory, the one-time Virginia commit.
He made a recent official visit to Tennessee, but has also been to Vanderbilt and Maryland in the last month officially.
It feels like Tennessee is in a good spot with Mallory and given the success Zeigler has had here there is a blueprint in place for a smaller point guard to be successful in this program.
Mallory has previously indicated that he will make a decision following his high school season.
Tennessee remains in pursuit of St. Louis point guard Zyree Collins who made an official visit in January. We feel like the Vols are in strong position with the under-the-radar point guard that the staff seems to be very high on.
Baseball
The competition should be cranked up a notch for the Vols this weekend with Samford coming to town. The program was picked to finish second in the SoCon this spring and was two votes behind the leader of UNC Greensboro. It’s a team that finished one game shy of an NCAA Tournament berth a season ago and one that added several transfers this offseason.
Lefty Miller Riggins will pitch on Friday for the Bulldogs and he’s a second-team preseason All-SoCon pick. Auburn transfer Cameron Keshock will start on Saturday and Birmingham Southern transfer Josh Leerssen gets the ball on Sunday. Second baseman Jeffery Ince is one to look out for in the order. The preseason second-team All-SoCon nod scored seven runs last weekend.
We will see if Dylan Loy makes his season debut this weekend. He was one who was sick early in preseason camp and was a few weeks behind in his throwing progression. Freshman Tegan Kuhns threw a bullpen this week and hopes to be available on Sunday to pitch in some capacity. He still might be held out, but if he pitches in this series, it’s likely on Sunday. He was sick all last weekend but was expected to pitch out of the bullpen last Friday for Opening Day.
Freshman Manny Marin tweaked his hamstring a little bit last weekend and was held out of Tuesday’s midweek thrashing of UNC Asheville. He should be good to go this weekend, but with the cold weather, we will see. Tony Vitello and the staff are obviously taking all the precautions with these guys as it is a long season.
Marin is just one of the several options this staff has to use in the lineup card. Andrew Fischer played third base for the first time in the midweek and with Dalton Bargo going off with a pair of homers, it wouldn’t be shocking to see those two stay where they are at third and first base, respectively, some this weekend. Cannon Peebles also caught for the second time on Tuesday after missing out behind the plate pretty much all preseason camp.
AJ Russell continues to come along. He threw to live hitters again yesterday and looked great. Sources have told us that he hit 93 mph with the fastball and still wasn’t throwing as hard as he could, by design obviously. He has dominated his recovery and is on track to see the mound soon. We continue to think it’s at least by the start of SEC play, but it wouldn’t be shocking for him to start a Tuesday game his first time out. Once he does make his return to the mound, they will slowly build him up.
One final note. Alberto Osuna’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, Feb. 26. So, it’s possible Tennessee could have him active by the time the team heads to Houston.
The post War Room — Football staff set, recruiting offers, hoops home stretch, baseball appeared first on On3.
