The numbers behind Dylan Sampson's stellar start

It started with a run up the middle for no gain.

Tennessee went back to Dylan Sampson on the next play anyway. On that carry, he found space to his right and picked up eight yards. Then 10 more yards on the run after that.

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In a first half where the Vols' run game found little rhythm, they leaned on Sampson on their second to last drive before halftime at Oklahoma last Saturday and Tennessee's stellar running back delivered.

He rushed for all 46 yards on that possession and paid it off with a 1-yard touchdown run that all but put the Sooners away by the intermission. Sampson ground his way to a game-high 92 yards--his first outing without rushing for 100 or more yard in five games--in the Vols' 25-15 SEC-opening victory.

"Running the football is our baseline, our bread and butter. It’s how we get started," Tennessee head coach Josh Heupel said. "I thought with the structure changes, the pressures that they were bringing, it took us a little bit of time to get hat on a hat and create some vertical seams. Our backs getting used to the angles of how everything was unfolding. But that drive was big and a couple of the conversions were big later in the football game, too."

Sampson, once the third option in a veteran-laden running backs room, is now the headliner of Tennessee's run game and one of the best backs in college football.

His numbers back up the claim.

Through four games, Sampson has rushed for 449 yards on 69 carries, good for eighth nationally and second in the league despite being on the sideline for much of the second half in games against Chattanooga and Kent State because of the Vols' lopsided leads.

Sampson has been particularly efficient in the redzone, helping lead Tennessee's resurgence inside of the 20-yard line with scores on 22 of 24 attempts there.

He leads the FBS with 10 touchdowns, seven of which have come from 9 yards or less. In the Vols' 71-0 thumping of Kent State, Sampson tied a program record for single-game touchdown runs with four. Two of those scores were in the red zone.

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"I think that's the hunger part of it, that you want to get in the end zone and be able to punch it in. Also, the feel of it," Tennessee running backs coach De'Rail Sims said. "It's like for a running back when they get in that zone when they're running the football, whether it's zone scheme or whatever scheme you run, and they start to feel it. It's like they're running blind.

"They can feel where the holes are going to open up. I think (Sampson) just has an innate ability to find the end zone once he gets to that point in time in the game."

It took Sampson just three games to reach the halfway point of a Tennessee program record.

Sampson, who has three or more touchdowns in three of the Vols' first four games, is nearing striking distance of the single season rushing touchdown record with at least eight games left.

Gene McEver holds the record with 18 touchdowns in 1929 while Reggie Cobb is the modern record holder with 17 in 1987. Sampson needs just seven more scores to tie one of those and nine to break the record. He is currently averaging 2.5 scores per game.

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Sampson's streak of consecutive 100-yard rushing games ended 8 yards shy of five games against Oklahoma--a streak that dated back to his first career start in Tennessee's 35-0 win over Iowa in the Citrus Bowl in January, but he has opportunity to move up the record books in that category.

Two more 100-yard rushing performances will tie Sampson for sixth all-time, including with former teammate Jalyen Wright, who had six 100-yard games in 2023. Seven games would tie him for second with Travis Stephens, Travis Henry, Jamal Lewis and Chuck Webb. Jay Graham holds the top spot at 11 games in 1995.

Tennessee went nearly a decade without a 1,000-yard rusher. Jaylen Wright ended that drought with 1,103 yards last season.

Sampson is in position to do the same. His 449 rushing yards are 137 yards better than where Wright was four games into the 2023 season and in less quarters. It helps that Sampson has taken a bulk of the carries due to injuries at the position.

The next running back with the second most carries behind Sampson is DeSean Bishop, who has carried the ball 38 times--more than 30 less carries than Sampson.

Sampson is averaging 112.2 yards per game, which is second in the league behind Arkansas' Ja'Quinden Jackson while his 6.5 yards per carry is third among SEC running backs and top 30 nationally.

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Sampson has had the benefit of running behind a veteran offensive line, though it was missing two key pieces at both tackle positions against Oklahoma. Still, he's totaled 278 yards after contact and is averaging 4.3 yards on those runs along with 145 yards on breakaway runs, according to Pro Football Focus.

"When you sit there and look at a lot of the runs that we've had, especially the explosive runs, everybody is on the same page," Sims said. "I think it's like poetry in motion a little bit when the running backs, the tight ends and the offensive line are all synced together which you've seen on multiple occasions this year. It's been really good. I think they feed off one another too."

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