Everything Jeremy Pruitt said about Tennessee’s win over Vanderbilt

On the decision to play both Harrison Bailey and JT Shrout:

“Well, no. We kind of went with a feel for it there. Let me tell you, Harrison is not going to do anything but improve, right? On the fumble there, lots of things that he needs it work on. It’s not knowing what to do or where to go with the ball. It’s how fast that he plays. And that’s normal for a guy that’s going into this league. So we had a plan to play JT because he played really well last week, just to see how he would do this week. We thought he did well. Decided to go back with Harrison at halftime and gave them both opportunities. But they’re both young players. The one thing they missed with fall camp is the opportunities to play in live situations. The way the season started early, it didn’t work out that way. So we’re giving them both opportunities.”

On what Harrison Bailey and JT Shrout have done to earn playing time over the last couple of weeks:

“For Harrison, just opportunity. Based off the circumstance of fall camp, he got no chances. Nothing he had control over. So we weren’t going to put him in a situation where he didn’t have a chance to have success. So that’s the one thing JT did get, opportunities in fall camp. He didn’t hardly have the same circumstance. So with the extra practices and the extra reps, and really having these two or three off weeks during the season, has given both of them an opportunity. It’s hard to go play, and play at a high level at quarterback, if you don’t get a chance to take a lot of reps. I say that, it’s just the circumstances of having so many guys out just didn’t give them opportunities much.”

“Well, we were playing another quarterback.”

On why senior wide receiver Velus Jones has been more productive the last two weeks:

“I think there’s probably a lot to that. Velus got here at midyear. Only with two practices, that didn’t help him, obviously. And the way fall camp was for a lot of those guys, it didn’t give us a great opportunity offensively, especially in the throw game, to create chemistry. But again, with the extra time, it’s helped with Velus. You see him gaining more confidence. He’s more than just a return guy and a rocket sweep guy. He’s a guy that is developing into a good route-runner and catching some balls down the field that can create some explosive plays. Catching some contested balls. Has done it the last couple weeks.”

On junior corner Bryce Thompson’s pick-six:

“Bryce pulled his hamstring last week and that’s happened to a couple guys, just with the stop, start part of it. So that’s why he only played on third down. I thought it was a really good call by Coach Ansley there. We got pressure. Quarterback got out of the pocket, we had the next guy that was there. Bryce made a great play and there were two or three blocks there that helped him get in the end zone.”

On how important the win is for him during his tenure:

“Really, the losses are about me and the wins are about the players. I didn’t play any plays tonight. These guys went out and worked hard. They’ve worked hard all week. It’s good to see them be on top. Our coaches have done a really nice job keeping them kind of moving in the right direction. We have a really young team and these guys, the way they practice and compete, they’re going to continue to improve and get better. That’s one thing about it. Nobody wants this to be their last game at Tennessee. I’m talking about players. They want to play. They want to play for a long time. So as long as keep having games, it gives them an opportunity to improve as a football player.”

On Tennessee’s run defense the past two weeks:

“I feel like for the most part this year, we’ve had pretty good run defense. You want to eliminate the explosive plays, obviously. When people start getting chunk plays on you, it runs up in a hurry. I think a lot of that, everybody always talks about run defense being the defensive front. I believe, to me, if you want to be a really good run defense, the secondary has to be involved in how you fit at the third level. The runs that pop out there, if something gets messed up, it needs to be a seven-yard gain not a 17-yard gain. We had a couple of them, like right before the half. We had a mistake there, had the ball bounce out and it should’ve been playing zone and we had a guy running man-to-man. It ended up giving them an opportunity to score before the half.”

On generating a pass rush against Vanderbilt QB Ken Seals:

“They stayed behind the chains a lot in the game, so it’s a lot easier to create pressure if you know they’re going to throw the football. The scoreboard dictated a lot of that probably, too. I thought our guys up front, they continue to work. We’ve not finished. We got the guy off the spot a few times, but finishing on sacks, we’ve got to improve there. But we did affect the quarterback.”

On Tennessee playing with more confidence:

“I thought defensively the first two drives I think were like minus-nine yards, right? Then they got a 3rd-and-10 and they check and we don’t check. We should’ve killed (the call) and we don’t and gave them an easy first down. Then they kind of made some first downs, ended up scoring a touchdown there. We were playing a three-deep zone, we don’t get the middle of the field. I thought after that we settled down and played. They made a play right, threw the nine route on Alontae (Taylor). He’s got good coverage, kid made a good throw and a good catch. That’s going to happen in this league. We stopped them, they kicked a field goal. Other than that, I thought until I guess the drive there in the fourth quarter, had a couple chances there. Had two penalties and then had a ball go right through our hands. I thought defensively we played pretty good.”

On Tennessee’s fake punt call to Henry To’o To’o:

“I know these guys think we’re never going to run these things. A lot of these things we’ve worked on forever. It was just a play we thought would be there at the right time. So we called it. We done a nice job blocking up front. They had a block on, so Henry had to find his way through there. (Ja’Quain) Blakely done a nice job in protection and Paxton (Brooks) put it on him. We didn’t get any points out of it, but it was a good play. I’ll tell you what it did: It changed the field position.”

On if playing Harrison Bailey and JT Shrout has anything to do with next season:

“When we decided to go with Harrison and JT — Brian (Maurer) got hurt tonight, he made a nice run down there — we’re looking for the future. We kind of stayed the course through the season, the way the stop and start and getting these guys caught up a little bit, gives us an opportunity. Just felt like it’s the right thing to do. Just looking at how they practice and perform. It’s not a whole lot of difference in any of them, really. Getting that opportunity means for these guys to get some live action.”

On if Tennessee’s secondary had any coverage busts against Vanderbilt:

“There was only one busted coverage. It wasn’t busted. I mean, when we play middle-of-the-field coverage, we try to cheat the middle-field safety and get him involved in the run. So he’s got to do a nice job with his eyes, reading uncovered linemen. We had a young kid made a mistake and he’ll learn from it. It was this past week (in practice), probably four or five snaps in a row I’m standing back there with him in the back just looking at the center or the guard, just so you can kind of cheat it a little bit. It don’t do you any good to go back there and play 40 yards deep in the middle of the field if they’re running the football, right? But it don’t do you any good when they’re throwing the ball, not having a middle-field safety. There’s a fine line and we pride ourselves in coaching this. We got to do a better job to coach him up so we don’t have that happen.”

On what he thought about Sarah Fuller kicking for Vanderbilt:

“I think it’s awesome. I said earlier in the week, having a daughter earlier this year, just the opportunity that Sarah Fuller has probably created for other young ladies that maybe want to follow that path one day. She done a fantastic job on the soccer team here at Vanderbilt. She’s obviously a winner. And she walked out there and kicked it right through. So I just think it says a whole lot about her. Really kind of her fortitude to be brave enough to go do this. I think it says a whole lot about her.”

On why Henry To’o To’o caught the fake punt:

“He’s the personal protector. So if we were going to run that play, I didn’t want to change people. But Henry played tailback in high school. He’s got as good of hands as anybody on the team.”

On Tennessee’s defensive front generating pressure:

“We did get some pressure. I think some of it had to do with us. I think some of it may have had to do with that quarterback. The one we played last week (Kyle Trask), I think he’s in his fifth year in college. This young man (Ken Seals) that was playing tonight is in his first year. Whether we want to admit it or not, most of the time in this sport we get better the longer we play. So this young man tonight is going to be a fine football player in this league. He’s already doing a really nice job. I think it probably went both way.”