Tennessee football returns to Neyland Stadium for the first time in 287 days Saturday afternoon when they take on instate foe ETSU in its home opener. The Vols will host a familiar face on the away sidelines as former Tennessee tight end Charlie Browder returns to Neyland Stadium with ETSU.
Browder was a walk-on tight end at Tennessee from 2022-2024 where he combined to play 52 total snaps and caught two passes for 10 yards during the 2023 season.
The former Tennessee walk-on entered the transfer portal following the 2024 season and landed at ETSU. The Kingsport native is ETSU’s starting tight end and got his redshirt senior season off to a nice start, catching two passes for 32 yards in the Bucs’ 45-17 blowout win over Murray State.
Browder went to the Christ School in Asheville before beginning his collegiate career at UCF. After redshirting the 2021 season in Orlando, Browder transferred back up to east Tennessee.
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Leaving Tennessee was a good move for Browder to earn playing time in his final freshman season. The Vols’ tight end room is one of the best on their roster. Tennessee leaned heavily on veterans Miles Kitselman and Ethan Davis in its season opening win over Syracuse.
Freshman Jack Van Dorselaer played sparingly in the game and fellow freshman DaSaahn Brame is extremely talented and consistently made plays during Tennessee’s fall camp.
Tennessee leaned on 12 personnel heavily in its season opening win over Syracuse though it didn’t always look like it did a season ago. The Vols still didn’t throw the ball to tight ends much with Kitselman catching two passes for 10 yards and Ethan Davis didn’t catch either pass Aguilar targeted him on.
Kickoff between Tennessee and ETSU is at 3:30 p.m. ET on Saturday afternoon at Neyland Stadium. Matt Schumacker, Dustin Fox and Stephanie Otey are on the call as both SEC Network+ and ESPN+ stream the week two game.
