| Column 1 | Column 2 |
|---|---|
📈 | Special teams — How do you not love what Mike Ekeler’s unit did against Pitt. A blocked punt, pinned them inside the 5, great kickoff coverage, Chase McGrath has been perfect on his kicks and Velus Jones made noise in the kickoff return game. An A+ week for the kicking game. |
📉 | Joe Milton and the deep ball — It’s just been a struggle. Outside of the ball to Hyatt that he couldn’t haul in and that he got hurt on, Milton hasn’t been close on a deep ball and he’s had some receivers open. Milton has a half dozen over throws in two games. Can he get dialed in with his receivers? |
↔️ | Hendon Hooker — Hooker came in cold threw two touchdown passes and let the team on three scoring drives. So he obviously did some good things including running the ball well. But Hooker also turned the ball over twice and the offense didn’t play as fast with him in the game. |
📈 | The tight ends — Jacob Warren and Princeton Fant combined for 9 catches and 105 yards receiving and Warren had the touchdown catch. Really impressed with the way Josh Heupel and Alex Golesh used the tight ends in their game plan against Pitt. The question now is how does their role grow moving forward. |
📉 | The offensive line -- You can't have 10 penalties in two games and be a part of giving up 8 sacks in 8 quarters if you are going to have a chance to surprise some people in the SEC. Throw in 33 yards rushing by the running backs last week and the offensive line has to clean things up. |
↔️ | The QB decision — Who starts at quarterback this week is irrelevant as the Vols who’s 0-2 Tennessee Tech. The question is who’s the quarterback a week from now getting ready to go to Florida? |
