West Virginia Stomps Tennessee And Confirms All Of Our Concerns About The 2018 Vols

West Virginia spoiled Jeremy’s Pruitt’s Tennessee debut by throttling the Vols 40-14. Will Grier carved up the Vols overmatched secondary all day while Dana Holgersen had perhaps his most glorious hair day since this:

What’s concerning about today is that while Grier finished with 429 yards and 5 TDs, he could’ve had about 500 yards and 7 TDs if he’d hit all of his throws in the first half. He missed a few open guys and strangely held the ball too long and ran around often during the first thirty minutes, before settling in during what was almost a perfect second half. I wrote yesterday that I thought the Tennessee defense while being much improved, would also be the strength of the team, but they didn’t come close to my expectations today. It was a typical "we just got torched for over 500 yards and 40 points" performance; missed tackles, busted coverages, guys in the wrong spot, etc. The secondary in particular stood out for their ineptitude, especially their cornerbacks. They couldn't have covered my Angry Old Man today, and yes, he's old, slow, fat, and white.

On the bright side, the Vols won’t face a better quarterback than Grier all season; he’s a probable first round NFL talent with a strong, accurate arm, and if WVU has a really good year, a Heisman candidate. But they also won’t be playing a bunch of no talent stiffs the rest of the year either, and it won’t matter how poor the QB play is on the other side if the defense is even worse.

I don’t understand all this “unleashing Nigel Warrior” crap that was put out there this off-season. As far as I can tell the only reason he’s hyped as much as he has been is because he’s got an awesome name and his dad is Vol legend Dale Carter. Other than that I just see him running around missing tackles and getting beat in coverage. But he’s not the only disappointment on that side of the ball, considering there's no one on Tennessee’s defense that appears to be a game changer or impact guy. Who is the player that keeps opposing coaches up at night? Better yet, where’s the nasty?

In other bad news, for the 1000^th straight year, the offensive line looks like it's going to be a problem. On play 1 of the season Brandon Kennedy whiffed about as bad as you can on a block and allowed Jarrett Guarantano to get body slammed into the grass less than two seconds after he received the snap. Sure, they opened up a few holes for the run game here and there, but most of the success of the ground game was achieved by Tim Jordan outside of the tackles. And while Guarantano impressed me with his accuracy, he also only had one pass play that went for more than 20 yards. Why? Because I don’t think Pruitt and OC Tyson Helton trust the O-Line to hold blocks long enough for anything to open up down the field.

Here are the ten Tennessee drives:

3 plays, -15 yards, punt

9 plays, 36 yards, punt

3 plays, -7 yards, punt

17 plays, 78 yards, TD

5 plays, 30 yards, punt

3 plays, 0 yards, punt

5 plays, 75 yards, TD

6 plays, 23 yards, punt

8 plays, 61 yards, downs

4 plays, 12 yards, end of game

So you’ve got one methodical drive that ended with a TD, one quick drive that ended with a TD, and five drives that ended with less than 25 yards. Why? Guarantano is accurate and isn’t afraid to stand in the pocket even if that means he’ll get demolished. Ty Chandler (who got hurt) and Tim Jordan are competent backs, and they’ve got three receivers (Marquez Callaway, Brandon Johnson, and Jauan Jennings) who can get open and catch passes. It’s because the offensive line was really bad. There’s no consistency drive to drive or play to play from them, even against a mediocre West Virginia defense that’s going to get torched 6 or 7 times against their Big 12 conference foes this season.

I thought Pruitt had a solid debut and I liked the gutsy call on 4^th and goal in the first half that resulted in a touchdown. Butch Jones definitely would’ve kicked the field goal in that situation. One game, even as badly as this one went, doesn’t define what kind of coach he’ll be, or even what kind of a season Tennessee will have the rest of the year. We won’t learn anything about this team the next two weeks against either ETSU or UTEP; we’ll have to wait until September 22 against Florida to see how this team responds to similarly skilled athletes trying to beat them. If Pruitt is good at getting the most out of his players, and all the available evidence suggest that he is, then I suspect the team will get better each week. There's a chance this could be their worst performance of the season, but if they don’t want to get their heads ripped off by the physical athletes in the Florida front seven in three weeks, they'll need to muster a much better performance.