‘The box score doesn’t do it justice and it’s unfortunate’ – ESPN’s Cole Cubelic says one Tennessee player quietly dominated Auburn
One Tennessee Vols defender was more dominant against the Auburn Tigers than the box score shows.
If you look at the box score of Tennessee’s 24-14 win over Auburn, two performances stand out.
Running back DeSean Bishop’s 220 rushing yards and three touchdowns and defensive back Dejuan Lane’s nine tackles, two sacks, and one interception.
Those two players were terrific, and they won SEC offensive and defensive player of the week honors as a result.
What the box score doesn’t show is how dominant Vols defensive lineman Xavier Gilliam was against the Tigers.
Gilliam was credited with just two tackles (including one tackle for loss), but his impact on the game was much bigger.
“People will look at the box score, and you’ll see Xavier Gilliam had two tackles — one solo and one TFL,” said Cubelic on McElroy and Cubelic in the Morning. “I’m gonna tell the people who didn’t watch this game — that was as dominant of a defensive tackle performance as you will see this year, as far as making things happen. He forced the quarterback to move. He forced the quarterback’s eyes down. He forced runs to bounce. He forced runs to cut. He forced plays to essentially die before they got started because of how good he was inside. He absolutely ate up the Auburn offensive line.
“They played some bear defense where they’re going to cover both guards, so the center can’t help. There’s nowhere to go, nothing you can do. And he just ate. It was bull rush, it was quickness, it was strike and shed. It was a clinic of lining a guy up over the center and saying, ‘Hey, we need you to ruin their game plan.’ The box score doesn’t do it justice, and it’s unfortunate that people will look at other guys with TFLs and sacks and they won’t think that he had that kind of a game. But I’m just telling you folks that don’t know, Xavier Gilliam is that guy, and he dominated this game for the Tennessee defense.”
Gilliam, who spent the first two seasons of his career at Penn State, arrived at Tennessee in January with three seasons of eligibility remaining.
It’s looking increasingly likely, though, that he’ll be NFL bound after just one season on Rocky Top — he’s having that good of a year.
