Tennessee football returns just one starting offensive lineman from last season’s playoff team.
Lance Heard, who was a first-year Vol and sophomore in 2024, is back on the roster as the projected starting left tackle. This comes after a year where he battled through injury, causing him to go through some struggles.
Now, he’s healthy and poised for a breakout season. With high expectations, Heard is taking on an advanced leadership role, as well. This caused fellow Tennessee lineman Sham Umarov to dub him the ‘head coach’ of the offensive line.
“He’s one of the biggest speakers in our room,” Umarov said. “The way he speaks, you can see everybody is locked in like he’s the head coach in our unit… When we’re all talking, like I said, we’re so tight that we all listen to each other.”
This leadership extends to both sides of the ball. Heard is not just coralling the offensive linemen, but also giving a helpful voice to the defense.
During practice, the fronts are competing with each other and trading blows. While it can get frustrating to be on the losing side, Heard and company realize it’s more beneficial to coach each other and share what works and what doesn’t.
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“We love it because he’s always smiling,” Umarov said. “He’s contributing to the people around him. Whether that is the whole OL room or the opposite side, like the D-Line. You can see a lot of negative when an O-Lineman beats a D-Lineman or a D-Lineman beats an O-Lineman, but we’re getting to the point where iron sharpens iron and we’re coaching each other. You can see it in camp, we’re getting better.”
This offseason transformation as a leader isn’t all that’s changed for Heard. He’s also completely changed his body.
Since last year, Heard has cut significant weight while keeping his muscle. This is allowing him to be far more agile while still having the push he needs.
Offensive line coach Glen Elarbee sees the benefit of that. With better technique also in the mix, it’s easy to see why expectations for him are growing.
“He’s changed his body. He’s done a great job, man,” Elarbee said. “We were kind of laughing. An offensive staffer, I’m not going to throw who it was under the bus, but they were maybe mistaken Lance for some of the other skinnier tackles because he’s done such a better job getting his weight under. Man, he’s lost weight but he ain’t lost an ounce of power and he’s way stronger. He’s redirecting better. His hands in pass pro are way better. Footwork, getting a base and being able to maintain blocks and great movement and play with violence. Credit to that guy, man, he’s done an unreal job. Really good job.”
