Vols put pressure on teams to match fast pace
Tennessee opened its 62-24 victory at Missouri two years ago with a 28-3 surge, and the Volunteers closed last season’s 66-24 trampling of the Tigers in Knoxville on a 38-0 run.
When Josh Heupel’s Vols have erupted, Eli Drinkwitz’s Tigers haven’t responded.
“You have to play complementary football in the sense that when the defense gets stops, the offense has to answer,” Drinkwitz said, “and if the defense doesn’t, then you still have to find ways to answer. Offensively, we haven’t been able to keep pace, and defensively, we’ve got to do a good job of finding stops in the game.
“The pressure they put on you is that they can score so fast.”
Saturday afternoon will mark the first top-16 matchup in Faurot Field history as the No. 14 Vols visit the No. 16 Tigers in a pairing of 7-2 teams that are also 3-2 in Southeastern Conference play.
Tennessee’s 128 points amassed the past two seasons against Mizzou are more than the Vols have tallied in three combined meetings against either Alabama, Florida, Kentucky or South Carolina. The Vols racked up 724 yards in last season’s thrashing of the Tigers, breaking the school’s single-game standard, and Tennessee had never scored as many as 66 points against an SEC foe.
Mizzou has failed miserably against Tennessee’s tempo during the past two meetings, and Drinkwitz didn’t feel much better this week when asked how it has been simulated in practice.
“I don’t feel comfortable with it at all,” he said. “When we’ve been watching the film with the defensive staff, I didn’t feel like we were giving the guys a realistic look. I think the reality is that it’s not just about the speed they go but the movement. You’ve got to find the ball. The ball goes from hash to hash.
“They have speed-ball packages that they roll in from one play to another, so they’re very calculated. They don’t try to maneuver players. They know where the play should end up, and they’re just going to stand right there and run another play. I don’t ever feel comfortable replicating their speed.”
Drinkwitz entered his fourth season in Columbia with a 17-19 record, so this is easily his best year. His
Tigers can’t do any worse against the Vols than the past two outings, but will their best effort yet result in a win?
“I don’t think you can utilize anything from last year to this year other than that sick feeling in your stomach,” Drinkwitz said. “What happened last year really doesn’t matter. We’ve got two new teams, and we’ve got to figure out what they did so effectively against us and try to limit those things.”
Two fast starters
Tennessee has scored touchdowns on seven of its nine opening possessions this season, which includes the first-play touchdown run by Joe Milton III against the University of Texas at San Antonio on Sept. 23 and last weekend’s second-play scoring run by Jaylen Wright against Connecticut.
The Vols are outscoring foes 89-29 through the first 15 minutes of games, which is an average advantage of 10-3 heading into the second quarter, but Mizzou is almost as strong with a 73-48 edge. In their two losses this season, the Tigers led LSU 15-7 and led Georgia 7-3 after the first quarter.
“They’ve started fast, and in particular at home,” Heupel said. “We’ve got to start fast in this one, too. At the same time, if you don’t, you’ve got to play for 60 minutes.
“We know the type of atmosphere it’s going to be and the type of football team that we’re playing.”
One yard allowed
In 35 games under Heupel, the Vols have allowed just 44 yards in punt returns, or 1.26 yards per game.
Tennessee has allowed only four returns this season, with those four netting one whopping yard. Heupel credited all 11 players on the punt team but especially redshirt freshman punter Jackson Ross from Melbourne, Australia.
Ross has routinely displayed the ability to punt with either foot and is averaging 43.4 yards per attempt this season.
“When I watched his recruiting film, it was as unique and as good as any recruiting tape that I had seen,” Heupel said.