‘With decent quarterback play this season, Tennessee would be unbeaten’ – ESPN leaves no doubt on how they see Vols vs Bama game playing out
The Tennessee Volunteers will take on the Alabama Crimson Tide in Knoxville on Saturday afternoon.
ESPN’s Bill Connelly has the same take on this weekend’s Tennessee vs Alabama game that, well, pretty much everyone has.
Going into this game, the general feeling is that Tennessee’s quarterbacks will have to make some plays down the field for the Vols to have a real chance to win.
Sophomore George MacIntyre is expected to start at quarterback for Tennessee on Saturday, but true freshman Faizon Brandon could also see some action.
Regardless of who gets the majority of the quarterback snaps, Connelly isn’t convinced the Vols will be able to generate enough offense to beat Alabama.
“Tennessee has an excellent running game and an even better pass defense. … With decent quarterback play this season, Tennessee would be unbeaten,” noted Connelly. “Freshman Faizon Brandon proved unready and far too sack prone, and George MacIntyre threw two picks in a closer-than-expected win over Arkansas last week.
“The Vols’ defense could make life difficult for Alabama quarterback Keelon Russell, who took four sacks against Georgia last week. Russell is a big-play hunter, to his credit and detriment, and those tendencies have paired well with an efficient but not particularly explosive run game. The Crimson Tide still nearly beat Georgia despite Russell’s mistakes, but he’ll probably be without his most explosive target, the injured Ryan Coleman-Williams. Tennessee could suck Bama into a bit of a defense-and-field-position game, but at some point the Vols’ quarterback will need to make a big throw. We don’t really have evidence that that will happen.”
Connelly is right — we haven’t seen evidence yet that Tennessee’s offense can consistently connect on big plays.
But that doesn’t mean it can’t happen. Tennessee’s quarterbacks aren’t a finished product. They’re both still very young and very much growing as players. They should improve the more they play.
So while the explosive pass game hasn’t happened yet for Tennessee, there is an expectation that it will eventually happen. And who knows, maybe this weekend against Alabama is when the Vols’ pass game finally fires on all cylinders.
