Tennessee football has found its new kicker. The Vols dipped into the transfer portal and picked up the commitment of Louisville transfer kicker Cooper Ranvier, according to Matt Zenitz. He just rounded out his redshirt freshman season and will have three years of eligibility remaining.
Ranvier connected on 21-of-25 field goals in 2025. This included 6-for-6 inside 30 yards, 13-for-13 inside 40 and 19-for-20 inside 50. He went 2-for-5 from 50+ yards with a long of 51. He went 39-of-41 on extra-point attempts.
As a true freshman in 2024, he took one extra-point attempt and made it. He is from Lexington, Kentucky, where he attended Fredric Douglass.
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Ranvier will replace Max Gilbert as the Vols’ kicker. Gilbert was the starter at UT for two seasons, but entered the transfer portal and made his way to Arkansas after a rough 2025 season.
Gilbert finished his redshirt sophomore season making 8-of-10 attempts less than 40 yards, 4-of-6 attempts between 40 and 50 yards and 2-of-3 attempts over 50 yards. He was perfect on extra points.
Ranvier now joins a trio of place kickers in the special teams room. The Vols return redshirt-freshman Grady Dangerfield and veteran Josh Turbyville, who is also the backup punter and starting kick-off specialist.
This is now the third time Josh Heupel has dipped into the transfer portal for a kicker, as well. When he got to UT, his first transfer addition was USC kicker Chas McGrath. He went on to make the field goal to beat Alabama in 2022, enshrining him in Tennessee lore.
The other was Charles Campbell from Indiana. The Tennessee native was the kicker for the 2023 season before running out of eligibility. Gilbert was the kicker for the 2024 and 2025 seasons. He had struggles in the 2024 campaign, as well, but got back on track later in the year for the College Football Playoffs run.
