The Young Get Younger
McKenzie is the headliner of another banner class for Tennessee, which will surely accelerate the surge of optimism in Knoxville under third-year coach Butch Jones. The Vols ended this past season on a hugely optimistic note, routing Iowa in the TaxSlayer Bowl with a lineup that was even greener than it was orange: In all, 23 true freshmen from Tennessee’s 2014 recruiting class saw the field at some point during the season, most in the nation, and against Iowa first- and second-year players outnumbered seniors on the official two-deep by a margin of 25-to-4. Considering the schedule — the non–SEC East portion of the slate included Oklahoma, Ole Miss, and Alabama —
the Vols were better than any team that young had any right to be, and after Wednesday the brakes on this bandwagon no longer exist.
Including McKenzie, Tennessee’s incoming class features five players in the composite top 100, two of whom (defensive linemen Kyle Phillips and Shy Tuttle) are already on campus as early enrollees; so is tailback Alvin Kamara, a former Saban signee who found the depth chart too crowded at Alabama, spent the 2014 season in junior college, and arrived in Knoxville last month as arguably the most coveted juco prospect in the nation. I could go on, but honestly I think four-star receiver Preston Williams’s signing day toggery is more than capable of taking it from here.