Tennessee was already planning to tinker its defense to face Georgia Tech’s triple-option attack, but an injury to starting middle linebacker Darrin Kirkland Jr. has forced the Vols to make further adjustments.
Second-year coordinator Bob Shoop stressed Thursday that Tennessee “can’t dwell on D.K. not being there” in the opener on Monday night, yet unlike a year ago, Shoop believes the Vols are better-suited to handle the adversity of a major injury.
"I feel worse for (Kirkland) than for anything else," Shoop said.
"Here's a guy who has worked really hard. He came back for the bowl game and played well. He had a good offseason and put himself in position to take the next step as a player. Injuries are part of it. We have dealt with it before. And as I said, the thing I really like about this team so far is that they haven't had any real high's and low's. They have been steady Eddie. That's been positive."
With no Kirkland Jr., Colton Jumper, who revealed Thursday he was in line to play a significant role at the strong-side linebacker spot, will start at the MIKE, and most interestingly, will be backed up by fourth-year linebacker Dillion Bates.
Considering the complexities and uniqueness of defending a flexbone offense, Tennessee will trot out some special personnel packages against Tech that are likely just one-game experiments. It's the latest iteration of Shoop's "Magic Show" defense, but just don't expect him to fully reveal his tricks.
"The focus is on beating Georgia Tech," Shoop explained, "so the players may be at a different position as we get into (facing) a more traditional offense. For this particular game, we've got them aligned where we think we need them aligned."
Bates has rarely received true defensive snaps at Tennessee, but Shoop said the redshirt junior has "a real nice knack" and has defended the triple-option well in practice. Elsewhere, Shoop continues to play coy about nickel-back Rashaan Gaulden, but the expectation remains that the redshirt sophomore will play a lot at outside corner. Also, Daniel Bituli, normally a middle linebacker, has flipped roles with Bates for Week 1.
"There's a group of guys, whether it's Bituli, who's had a really good camp, whether it's Austin Smith, who it's great to have him back in the mix.“Jumper and Bates have practiced really well," Shoop said.
"Freshman Will Ignont, this may not be his cup of tea, but he's going to be really good and will play a lot this year. Quart’e Sapp, Elliott Berry, and Cortez McDowell have had pretty good camps. In some way shape or form you will probably see all of those guys this week.”
During Thursday’s coaches meeting, Shoop revealed that the plan is to rotate a lot of bodies along the defensive line and at linebacker. Furthermore, secondary coach Charlton Warren added that all three safeties — Nigel Warrior, Micah Abernathy and Todd Kelly Jr. — will play a lot of snaps, too.
"Our focus is on putting our players in position to win this game. Some that may not be a permanent move, but for this game, we feel that is the position that (they) should play. Obviously we were thrown a little bit of a curveball with Kirkland, so we've also moved Jumper there. We're going to to play a lot of guys, probably more than you guys are probably thinking we are,” Shoop said.
“We talked about it this morning. We are probably going to play 7-8 guys in the secondary. You will probably see 6-7 linebackers and 8 or 9 guys up front and rotate guys. It's not intramurals, and it's not just giving guys (playing time), but Bates is going to play quite a bit. He's done a really good job. He's focused in. We've given him a very, very specific role, and he's done well with it.”
