War Room: Tennessee’s fall camp coming to a close, recruiting notes and hoops
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’s final major scrimmage is in the books and the Vols will turn their attention to game week or the ‘mock game week’ on Monday as classes start.
Next week the Vols will do everything like they are playing a game on Saturday, August 24th. Heupel and his staff will work things down to the fine details then will transition into game week on Sunday the 25th.
The Vols appear to be getting healthier. Lance Heard and Andrej Karic got scrimmage snaps on Thursday which was important for both. Heard is the starting left tackle. That’s not a debate, but he needs work at operation speed and he needs to build up his endurance for the tempo of the offense. Karic is battling for the starting left guard job and to be in that race he has to practice and he needed the scrimmage work.
With Nico Iamaleava out due to a stomach bug, Gaston Moore got the work with the first team offense and managed things just fine. There’s obviously a real drop in skill and talent, but Moore knows this system and had a solid day managing the game.
Having your starting quarterback wake up unable to go is not ideal but it did make the coaching staff have to adjust on the fly which is not a bad thing when you are trying to simulate every situation you can think of.
Donte Thornton and Gaston Moore hooked up for a deep ball to highlight things in the passing game. Thornton has had a good fall camp. He’s just missed some work due to a tender hamstring which is something he has battled off and on since he got here. But Thornton has plenty of confidence and is much more comfortable as an outside receiver and much more comfortable and confident in himself.
“As transparent as I can be, I think mindset,” wide receiver coach Kelsey Pope said of the difference in Thornton. “I think when he got here, there’s a ton of nervousness, there’s a ton of anxiety. He put pressure on himself a lot. I think the biggest thing that kid has done this off season, he’s just allowed himself to work as hard as he can and let the chips fall where they may.”
Part of that pressure also came from the fact offensive coordinator Joey Halzle labeled him a ‘freak’ before they ever put on pads last fall causing many to view Thornton as a plug-and-play guy to replace Biletnikoff winner Jalin Hyatt.
Last August here is what Halzle said of Thornton,
“To use the word,” Halzle said, “he has freaky talent. A guy that has size, that can run like that, is rare. He is rare. There are good players and then there are guys that have rare traits like that.”
Defensively, Joshua Josephs just keeps smiling, keeps playing and keeps growing in confidence. No one is saying that Josephs is this year’s Hyatt or Jaylen Wright in terms of cranking up his production exponentially, but Josephs is this year’s version of a guy who is figuring it out and has grasped the need to take a real step forward. Josephs’ off-season commitment to himself and football continues to show up this fall.
Wide receiver Bru McCoy got his way on Thursday and got a few scrimmage snaps. It wasn’t a heavy workload but it’s something McCoy felt like he needed and had been pushing for.
“I think the best thing for me is just to get back into it and back into the fire,” McCoy said last month.
On the facilitie’s front, it’s been a busy week. The news was good on the Neyland Stadium front as clean up is nearing completion around the stadium. Final railing and painting are being done to the student gate, grass has been sown and the G-10 entrance from Neyland Drive has been re-opened for the start of school on Monday. That entrance way has been closed this summer.
Speaking of reopening, the trench on Phillip Fulmer Way has been filled and repaved and that road has been opened as well this week to help with student traffic flow as well as prep for game day.
The Pilot signs on the east side of the stadium were being installed on Thursday, while work was being completed in the refurbishing of the the east side suites. As athletics director Danny White told Volquest two weeks ago, the south end of the stadium is going to be functional and operational but it won’t be the sexy in 2024 as that project needs another year to finish.
The Pilot sponsorship news didn’t come as a shock this week. We had noted all summer that we anticipated there would be a corporate logo on the field this fall. The news of the deal got plenty of attention locally and nationally.
Colleagues from around the country in the college athletics world have reached out to Tennessee and to the Vol Network to congratulate them and learn more about how they landed corporate money without changing the name of their stadium.
For schools like Texas, whose stadium is named after legendary coach Darrell Royal, getting corporate money and not changing a name is the goal. It’s a concept Tennessee delivered on before anyone else and many are trying to figure out how they can do the same.
The General Neyland statue was taken out of storage on Thursday and put in it’s new temporary home. The statue will return to Neyland Stadium somewhere after renovations are finished. Where exactly it will go is unknown. Where it had been will become a new entrance to the founders suites and there’s a thought of putting it in an area where fans can get up to it and see it on non-game days.
The news on the Lindsey Nelson Stadium renovations wasn’t as good this week, but again not a surprise. Those utility issues, which didn’t appear on the master map of campus, were just discovered after work crews broke ground and resulted in some major adjustments.
The discovery of the utility issues created serious delays in some of infrastructure work that was expected to get done during the season this spring. The length of time it’s taking to get that work done now means this is not a ‘three-phase’ or ‘three year’ project to completion.
Tennessee was waiting to get a more definitive word on what was realistic to get completed this off-season which is why they released on Thursday and update on the expectations for the project this off-season.
Recruiting
We have finally made it to ‘David Sanders Day’ coming up tomorrow. Tennessee has been in tremendous position for the last several months and nothing is changing for us with this one. The family has handled everything fantastically and David is someone that is wise beyond his years. Getting across the finish line in this one would give Tennessee the cornerstone of this 2025 class.
Onis Konanbanny pulls the trigger next Friday and credit Willie Martinez in this one. He is a massive reason Konanbanny and the Vols have been trending for a long time. Konanbanny is still raw as he hasn’t played football that long but his skillset is impressive with length being a major asset.
Tennessee continues to work USC commit running back Daune Morris. The hope is to get him here for a game early in the season and just keep chipping away at him. If he makes it in, it would be an unofficial to begin with, with an official visit set up after that if things continue to progress.
De’Rail Sims has quickly built a strong bond with elite running back Savion Hiter. The Vols clearly have his attention and are expected to host him again later in the fall. It would not surprise us to see Hiter trim his list heading into his junior season.
Jonaz Walton and Tyriq Green are a couple of other backs Tennessee has done a nice job with to this point in 2026. The staff likes Green’s versatility and he could play in the secondary at the next level as well.
Tennessee has done a nice job of getting IMG standout Breck Kolojay to campus over the last few months. He is high on the Vols and jives well with Glen Elarbee, the offensive staff, and current players in the room like Max Anderson and fellow Colorado native Gage Ginther. He plans to return to town for the Alabama game.
Elsewhere along the offensive line in the 2026 class, Tennessee is off to a good start with Virginia four-star Darius Gray. He and his family have been to Knoxville plenty, and they are comfortable around town and have enjoyed what they have seen from the staff so far.
Fellow Virginia standout Travis Johnson did not make it to town at the end of July, but he is planning to return for one of the bigger home games at Neyland Stadium later in the fall. He has clicked with Kelsey Pope and the Vols receivers coach is making him feel like an early priority.
The more we talk with pass-rushers, especially some in the 2026 class, the more James Pearce’s development and draft stock are a big selling point that is working in Tennessee’s favor.
The Vols are off to a nice start with guys like Tristian Givens and Cam Brooks from the Peach State. Both are planning to see Tennessee again during the fall. We also expect standout North Carolina EDGE Rodney Dunham to be back in town for the Florida game.
Hoops
Tennessee’s players and coaches, if they chose, had some time to get away last week and weekend before everyone reassembles for the final push of offseason workouts before preseason practice gets underway for real in less than two months (for real).
As we’ve mentioned in this space multiple times there’s certainly a sense that this was a good summer for the team as a whole, and it really needed to be.
That’s because of the obvious detail that the Vols are blending four veteran transfers into the line-up that are all expected to play big minutes. Establishing some cohesion in the summer is a bigger deal than ever in college basketball due to the portal.
We don’t have a lot to add to the tidbits we’ve been passing along form summer workouts.
If you saw the annual ‘end of summer’ traditional shirtless photo from the Volhoops account you could see that guys have put their time in the weight room to good use. As always Garrett Mendenwald does an excellent job in the strength and conditioning aspect of Tennessee’s program and the results are pretty obvious just from the eye test.
Individually Chaz Lanier probably isn’t going to have a Dalton Knecht-type of season, but after this summer most around the program would probably tell you he’s a Dalton Knecht-like shooter. Lanier routinely wins every shooting completion on both a daily and weekly basis on the drills that the staff charts.
Cam Carr’s biggest need this offseason was probably to get stronger, and while he’s never going to look like a linebacker, Carr has definitely added some weight and looks thicker in the shoulders.
You typically expect guys going from their freshmen to sophomore years to make the biggest S&C gains in the summer and that’s been the case with car as well as JP Estrella and Cade Phillips.
Having grown so tall so fast in high school, it’s probably going to take awhile for Estrella to really fill out, but Phillips’ gains are noticeable.
We continue to hear good things about the leadership of this team, which isn’t surprising considering that Zakai Zeigler and Jahmai Mashack are the two returning seniors on the squad.
Zeigler has been one of the most vocal guys on the team since he was a freshman. It has been a very easy and natural progression for him this summer.
Similarly, Mashack doesn’t come across as the most vocal guy, but even as a young player he was one of the most respected guys in the locker room because of his work ethic and attitude.
Those two guys have gotten high marks this summer for setting the example and taking charge.
On the recruiting front Tennessee is still pushing and waiting for an official visit date with five-star Caleb Wilson. The nation’s No. 4 overall player, Wilson has thus far only set two official visit dates. He’ll see Alabama on Sept. 6 and Kentucky the following week on Sept. 13.
This is a highly competitive recruitment with Arkansas, Auburn, North Carolina, Oregon and others in the mix but the Vols are in here swinging for the fences.
Tennessee is also awaiting on Acaden Lewis to pencil the Vols in for an official.
Lewis was a prospect who saw his stock soar maybe more than anyone this summer.
He has released a final eight of Michigan, Syracuse, UNC, UConn, Kentucky, Duke, Tennessee, and Auburn.
Lewis has told some that he will visit all eight schools before deciding. That seems unlikely, so the Vols had probably better get a commitment for an early date if they want to be contenders.
Lewis’ hesitation in setting dates, or in making them public, may be one reason Tennessee is bringing in Colorado combo guard Josiah Sanders for for a visit on Sept. 14.
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