Below is a look at Tennessee’s national stat rankings side-by-side with the corollary rankings for the South Carolina Gamecocks. The nutshell is that the run game is going to be extremely important for both teams, and the Gamecocks appear to have the advantage there on both sides of the ball.

Details below.

When the Vols have the ball

Where’s the opportunity?

South Carolina’s defensive resume is more impressive than Tennessee’s offensive resume, almost across the board. The only things that are sort of even matchups are third downs and passing yards.

Where’s the danger?

Throwing the ball against South Carolina appears to be a huge risk for the Vols. Tennessee ranks 109th in interceptions thrown, and the Gamecocks rank 11th in getting interceptions. They’re also much better in most other categories.

Gameplan for the Vols on offense

Run the ball. It’s the safest strategy. There are opportunities in the passing game, but there are also great risks.

Vols on defense

Where’s the opportunity?

The opportunities for the Vols on defense are found in the passing game. The Gamecocks are not generally earning many yards through the air, nor are they especially efficient or careful, and Tennessee is generally good on the opposite sides of all of those things. The Vols also appear to be in pretty good shape across the board on defense, with the exception of a couple of categories.

Where’s the danger?

The worst combination of them being good on offense and the Vols being vulnerable on defense is found in the run game. South Carolina ranks 36th in rushing yards per game, and the Vols rank only 67th in rushing yards allowed per game.

Gameplan for the Vols on defense

Devote more manpower to stopping the run.

Special teams

There’s an opportunity for the Vols on special teams, especially when returning punts, as they currently rank 9th in the nation while the Gamecocks rank 108th in the nation at defending punt returns. On the other hand, their punter can flip the field better than ours can.

Turnovers and penalties

Tennessee and South Carolina look pretty even in turnovers and penalties.

Generally speaking, a team’s national stat rankings don’t improve after playing the No. 1 team in the nation, so you don’t pull these up hoping to see some evidence of improvement. But let’s take a peek anyway.

Offense

Climbed out of the Bottom 30: Nothing.

Climbed into the Top 30: Nothing.

Fell into the Bottom 30: Passing Offense, but note that it joins seven other offensive categories already there.

Fell out of the Top 30: Passing Yards per Completion.

I like fall colors and all, but I’d rather not see it on my stat tables.

Defense

Climbed out of the Bottom 30: Nothing.

Climbed into the Top 30: Nothing.

Fell into the Bottom 30: Nothing.

Fell out of the Top 30: Nothing.

No movement in and out of general locations here this week, which is good news after playing a team with Alabama’s offensive firepower. Honestly, the Tennessee defense pretty much held its own.

Special Teams

Last week, I pointed out that there had been no red in this entire category since the BYU game. This week, there are three categories in the red: Kickoff Returns, Net Punting, and Punt Return Defense.

Turnovers and Penalties

Tennessee binged on penalties this week like they were coming off a 6-game fast, although they were force-fed some of that by servers in stripes.

In the off-season we do a series on Making Progress, on how the Vols can improve on the things they were very worst at in the previous year. Seven games into this season, Tennessee is moving in the right direction on most of those fronts:

• Running on third-and-short was the thing Tennessee was very worst at last season: 21 carries for 20 yards, the only team in college football to average less than 1.5 yards per carry (and the Vols averaged 0.95 yards per carry). It hasn’t gone from the basement to the penthouse, as you’d expect, but this year the Vols have 20 carries on 3rd-and-1-3 for 44 yards (2.20 ypc) and 13 first downs. Tennessee no longer has to go shotgun and hope for the best. (Stats via SportSource Analytics)
• Last year Tennessee ran fewer plays than any team in college football. This year the Vols are 116th of 130 in that department; they’re ahead of just five teams that have played seven games, and do have a handful of overtime snaps. Keep an eye on this number as the Vols enter a more winnable stretch of their season.
• Last season the Vols forced only 15 turnovers. Through seven games this year, Tennessee already has 13. Five against Chattanooga helped, but the Vols also had three against Florida and, more crucially, three against Mississippi State.
• In the massive improvement department: last year the Vols allowed opponents to score 41 times in 45 red zone visits, 120th nationally. So far this year opponents are just 25-of-32 (78.13%), 35th nationally. It’s bolstered by Chattanooga going 0-for-3 (which is still impressive), but the Vols also turned away Mississippi State once and intercepted Alabama.
• One area the Vols are yet to improve: explosive running plays. Last season Tennessee had 49 runs of 10+ yards, 116th nationally. Through seven games this season the Vols have 24 runs of 10+ yards, 115th nationally. Let’s see how that number improves when not facing Florida, Georgia, and Alabama.

Tennessee is better on a number of fronts, including the kind of significant improvement in turnovers and red zone defense that suggest a big difference on the scoreboard. What’s keeping that from happening?

Red zone offense.

In 24 red zone trips this season, Tennessee has only 10 touchdowns. That’s 41.67%, 124th nationally and one of just 16 teams scoring a touchdown less than 50% of the time they enter the red zone.

Here’s each of Tennessee’s 24 red zone possessions:

A word of praise is due Brent Cimaglia. Nine kickers with 7+ attempts have yet to miss a field goal this season. After those nine, no one has been better than Cimaglia’s 13-of-14 (92.9%). He made what were important kicks in the moment against Georgia State and BYU, gave Tennessee its first points at Florida, gave the Vols a two-possession lead against Mississippi State, and gave Tennessee a chance at Alabama. Perhaps we expect kickers to go 8-for-8 on attempts of 40 yards or less, but that’s usually not the exact result.

There’s enough bad to spread around on the red zone turnovers: Maurer’s two picks against Mississippi State, a ball Jauan Jennings should’ve caught at Florida, and Guarantano’s poor choice on Saturday night. Whatever it’s worth, JG also failed to get the backups in on four tries from the five yard line against Georgia’s backups. And Eric Gray was stuffed on an important early sequence against BYU, foreshadowing the end-around stop just outside the red zone later in the game.

Tennessee’s struggles at the doorstep have been particularly painful. At the end of the first half against Georgia State the Vols had two shots from the three yard line but couldn’t get in. Early in the fourth quarter the Vols had 3rd-and-2 at the Georgia State 14, but a pass to Austin Pope went for no gain and the Vols settled for three to take a 23-21 lead. Aside from the fourth down stops, against BYU the Vols also had 1st-and-Goal at the 9 early in the fourth quarter with a chance to take a two-possession lead up 13-10, but had to kick a field goal.

The interception at Florida was obviously painful, but with only two red zone visits I’m not sure Tennessee is winning that game either way. But what happened at Alabama was a microcosm of this problem before the Guarantano fumble. On the drive when Maurer was injured, the Vols had 1st-and-Goal at the 5 and went false start, no gain, holding, incomplete, then Guarantano missed Jennings on the double move. The other sequence was more about officiating, when 1st-and-Goal at the 7 led to a phantom holding penalty and then a missed pass interference call. But against Alabama, the Vols were so close to doing something really special on three separate drives, then went field goal, field goal, disaster.

So here’s some good news: on drives Brian Maurer finished, you do of course have a pair of end zone interceptions against Mississippi State, which we’re chalking up to some combination of freshman mistakes and a concussion. But the other red zone trips led by Maurer: a touchdown to open the third quarter against Chattanooga, the only points of the day at Florida (on a drive that reached only the 20), an A+ touchdown throw against Georgia, Tim Jordan’s touchdown run against Mississippi State, and a QB sneak touchdown at Alabama. In Maurer’s seven red zone drives, the Vols have four touchdowns, the field goal at Florida, and the two picks against Mississippi State. Obviously, you can’t throw picks in the end zone. But the other results have been good, including that throw against Georgia which is the best individual play Tennessee has made in the red zone this season and perhaps beyond. It’s a small sample size: Maurer is 1-of-6 in the red zone this year, the one being that touchdown, with two of the five incompletions being those interceptions. But Guarantano is 9-of-24 for 79 yards with five touchdowns and the interception at Florida. Those five touchdowns include the last-second TD against Georgia State, the batted-ball against BYU, the overtime TD catch by Jennings, and two scores against Chattanooga. When the windows get tight, everyone has struggled. Guarantano was better here last year too: 14-of-23 for 111 yards in the red zone, with seven touchdowns and, importantly, zero interceptions.

Everything is on the table, but if you’re going to expect anything in these next five games, I’d lean toward close calls. That means all of these red zone trips are going to count. And the Vols, who traded a chance for something special into Alabama’s spectacular last week, have to put the ball in the end zone more often. If Maurer comes back, can he continue this trend? If it’s Shrout, can he learn on the fly? And if it’s Guarantano, can he recover from everything he’s faced this season and get this team in the end zone?

“That’s the same team that lost to Georgia State,” is the rhetoric today from parts of Clemson, Columbus, Baton Rouge, and anywhere else a team fancies itself the best in the land.

It’s not, of course. You’re never really the same team in late October as you were in late August.

It is, unfortunately, the same season. Tennessee is still 2-5, and still needs a 4-1 finish to earn the bowl eligibility everyone assumed two months ago. But the Vols we saw in Tuscaloosa played way, way better than those same preseason assumptions allowed for.

They did it without Brian Maurer for most of the night, who left each of the last two games with only seven passing attempts for concussion protocol. They did it without Henry To’o To’o in the first half and Daniel Bituli for the second, a razor-thin position to begin with that somehow still held up. And they did it after catching the wrong end of several breaks from the officiating crew, including a pair of potentially game-changing calls in a matter of minutes.

And sure, we need a few words on Jarrett Guarantano. Last week the Vols play-called as if they were trying to win in spite of him, but Guarantano did go 6-of-7 for 106 yards, including a 41 yard bomb to Ramel Keyton that led to three points and the final strike to Tyler Byrd. They beat Mississippi State, in part, because of him doing what he needed to do on the few plays they asked him to do it.

The numbers were worse this time – 7-of-16 for 55 yards – but Guarantano did convert three third downs through the air in the second half, the first leading to three points and the other two on that 14-play drive.

It’s the end of that sequence that’s driving the outside conversation, and a fair percentage of what Tennessee fans are talking about too. Let’s consider what would’ve been true even if Guarantano didn’t fumble or actually scored.

Tennessee’s coaching staff has twice demonstrated their trust with Guarantano throwing the ball is already low. Whatever happened on that snap, it didn’t increase that level of trust. The other thing I believed to be true was, if Maurer couldn’t play, those coaches still believed JG gave Tennessee the best chance to win, and the feel-good story this season hopes to become is in need of those, now.

The move to put J.T. Shrout in the game cast some doubt on that, backed by a handful of those far closer to the program than I am not being nearly as surprised by the decision.

If Maurer isn’t an option, what do you do against South Carolina? It’s the latest of a series of difficult questions for Jeremy Pruitt. Answering difficult questions is in the job description, of course, but these are a different set of questions than we thought we’d be asking at this point in year two.

However, the questions we thought we’d be asking are getting answered in the affirmative more every week. Yesterday was one of the best performances from Tennessee’s offensive line in a long time, again despite obvious trust issues in the passing game. And Tennessee’s defensive line again made a difference: Alabama got just 4.1 yards per carry, the second-best performance by a Tennessee defense in this game in the last eight years.

Watching the way the Vols competed, there’s a hope we’re done with the +34.5 lines. Before Tua went out, the Vols came to play. Without him (but with Alabama’s army of five stars still intact), the Vols were competitive to the end.

It feels like we might be entering territory the Vols often found themselves in during basketball seasons of the past: capable of beating anyone, capable of being beat by anyone. It’s an exciting place to be! It can also be frustrating, especially with uncertainty at quarterback.

Tennessee has grown far beyond the team they were against Georgia State. In the big picture, the Vols are making progress in all the right places, restoring hope in this coaching staff and excitement for the future. In the short term, they may not like their options at quarterback, and have to manage a number of emotions with South Carolina coming to town in what’s become one of the biggest games of the year. Who’s going to get more questions about officiating this week between Pruitt and Muschamp? Who will be better at getting their team to respond from that kind of disappointment?

Everything is on the table for this team. That includes bowl eligibility and the hope such a run would inspire. And it includes more frustrating defeats behind more uncertainty at quarterback, enough to cast a shadow on this season’s overall progress. Especially in this season, we should’ve learned by now not to set expectations in stone for how it’s going to go the rest of the way. How’s it going to go this week?

As always, the Vols will be interesting in pursuit of the answer.

On the heels of the Mississippi State win, our community Expected Win Total stands at 4.82. As the name implies, we’re not expecting bowl eligibility yet, but the Vols are at least back in the conversation.

That particular point of progress isn’t likely to change in Tuscaloosa after dark, where the Vols are +34.5. But there’s a version of this where we come out of Saturday night feeling just as good (better?) about Tennessee’s chase for six wins.

Last year Alabama came to the Third Saturday in October looking like one of the best college football teams in the history of earth. Tennessee had more of a pulse than in 2017, when the Vols were dominated from start to finish, and also in 2016, when the #9 Vols were humiliated offensively. The 2018 Vols scored two second quarter touchdowns to make it 35-14, and were set to receive the second half kickoff. It ain’t much – and Bama punched it in just before halftime anyway – but against these guys, it was something. At 4.69 yards per play, you could at least entertain the notion of something good happening when the Vols snapped the ball.

This year, Alabama’s defense is certainly more vulnerable, though vulnerability is relative when your offense is averaging more than eight yards per play. But South Carolina (5.34 yards per play), Ole Miss (5.41), and Texas A&M (5.56) all had more success than we’re used to seeing teams of that caliber get against the Tide defense. I’m quite sure A&M has more talent than Tennessee right now, but South Carolina and Ole Miss are fair comparisons.

The 21 points Tennessee scored on Alabama last year were already the most in this rivalry (in regulation) for the Vols since…2001! You want Tennessee, especially if quarterbacked by Brian Maurer, to land enough punches to believe they can do the same against South Carolina, etc.

Of course, the other side of this coin is the other side of the ball, where progress this season would be holding Alabama to 41 points or less, or less than 6.5 yards per play. When you’re this kind of underdog, it’s hard to make covering the spread a success; I’m not sure we’re going to feel great about life if the Vols lose by 31. But this week feels more about maintaining the momentum established last Saturday. Maybe that comes via onside kicks and fourth down conversions – hey, maybe it’s an effective recruiting strategy for those young enough to pay attention after 9:00 PM ET – but the bigger picture is keeping this team not only together where it fell apart last November, but moving forward in the chase for six wins. The Vols came out of the last Third Saturday feeling like they’d done that, then followed it up with an almost-good-enough performance at South Carolina. Can we get a little more of the same this year?