Tennessee continued their recruiting road travels as the recruiting calendar is nearly in it's final week of in-home contacts.
Wednesday Butch Jones and Robert Gillespie were again in Louisiana. Wednesday it was to see running back Travis Etienne. Etienne was in Knoxville last weekend for an official visit and admitted he grew up a Vol fan. Etienne is scheduled to visit Clemson this weekend and LSU the last weekend.
Bob Shoop, Tommy Thigpen and Charlton Warren were with Shawn Shamburger in Georgia while Walt Wells worked Orlando and Zach Azzanni worked Atlanta.
Thursday, Jones will spend some time in Nashville doing some recruiting with several members of his staff. Tommy Thigpen, Robert Gillespie and Azzanni will all be in Nashville to see Maleik Gray, Ty Chandler and a lot of 2018 prospects.
Also Thursday night, Elijah Conliffe will host defensive line coach Steve Stripling. Conliffe will travel to Florida this weekend to visit the Gators then is scheduled to visit Alabama the last weekend. Head coach Butch Jones has not been in the Conliffe home. That visit will happen next week. In speaking to Conliffe Wednesday night, the Vols are in it but he seems pretty open right now which includes Florida. Conliffe said his trip to Knoxville was fun and that he's looking for the place where he feels most comfortable.
Friday the Vol coaches will roll back into town for a weekend of official visits that will feature 9 commitments along with uncommitted players Aaron Sterling and Tim Jordan. The list could grow a little as we are checking on one other potential new name. The current commitments scheduled to be in town are: James Brown, Matthew Butler, Marquez Bembry, Will Ignont, Solon Page, Shawn Shamburger, Cheyenne Labruzza, Jaquan Henderson, and Jacquez Jones.
Utah State assistant coach Mike Canalas hasn't been formally offered a job to accept by Butch Jones according to those close to Canalas. However, it's only a matter of time. Canalas, as we noted last week in the war room, has been the favorite for the job. He has had two interviews or meetings with the Jones and Vol offensive staff including a visit on Monday. We are told that second visit went well and Canalas left confident about his chances. We think Kevin O'Connell has been the other guy that's garnered the heaviest consideration but O'Connell's personal desire is to be in the NFL, even though right now he doesn't have any offers to be in the league as we understand it.
One interesting note on the timing of Canalas is that if he is hired and starts immediately then Vol quality control coach Walt Wells would have to come off the recruiting road unless there is another change on staff. The only way Wells can be on the road is if Jones doesn't have a complete full time staff. Now, it seems that they could hire Canalas and get around that rule by not having Canalas officially start until a later date.
On the athletic director front, the University of Tennessee made the following statement on Wednesday:
Dr. Davenport arrives on February 15 to begin serving at UT Knoxville’s chancellor. She has said that filling the AD position is one of her top priorities.
The athletic director serves as a member of the chancellor’s cabinet. Dr. Davenport has emphasized the importance of finding the best person for this key role.
The university is in the midst of a procurement process to hire a search firm to assist with the search.
Once that process concludes, UT will release information about the firm that is selected.
At that time, the campus will also announce the members of the search committee and provide a tentative schedule for the search process.
We hope to announce these details soon.
From there - the search committee and the firm will begin working together to begin the national search.
Dave Hart continues to serve as the Athletic Director for the UT Knoxville campus. His retirement date is June 30, 2017.
The message from the University is that the process of hiring an AD isn't close to being done and really isn't even underway. Clearly, Dr. Davenport is going to be involved in the decision. As for timeline, we don't believe it's going to be April or May. We feel it will be done before then. But it's not happening in the next month based on the University statement.
Now, in terms of candidates we don't think Phillip Fumer has lost steam in this race. He's very much a real candidate and could definitely end up being the next AD. The Fulmer camp doesn't seem to think anything is done, but there are plenty of rumblings from people who believe that Fulmer is the favorite. Don't expect Fulmer to do anymore interviews. He told our partners at WVLT that he isn't going to comment on the athletic director opening when he attended the media day for the Border Bowl (Tennessee/Kentucky all-star game) on Wednesday. He will do color commentary for the game this weekend.
But as we have seen this thing could change a lot. It does make you wonder given all the rumors and criticisms why the University didn't issue something much earlier to give a timeline to slow down all of the talk.
Wednesday Butch Jones and Robert Gillespie were again in Louisiana. Wednesday it was to see running back Travis Etienne. Etienne was in Knoxville last weekend for an official visit and admitted he grew up a Vol fan. Etienne is scheduled to visit Clemson this weekend and LSU the last weekend.
Bob Shoop, Tommy Thigpen and Charlton Warren were with Shawn Shamburger in Georgia while Walt Wells worked Orlando and Zach Azzanni worked Atlanta.
Thursday, Jones will spend some time in Nashville doing some recruiting with several members of his staff. Tommy Thigpen, Robert Gillespie and Azzanni will all be in Nashville to see Maleik Gray, Ty Chandler and a lot of 2018 prospects.
Also Thursday night, Elijah Conliffe will host defensive line coach Steve Stripling. Conliffe will travel to Florida this weekend to visit the Gators then is scheduled to visit Alabama the last weekend. Head coach Butch Jones has not been in the Conliffe home. That visit will happen next week. In speaking to Conliffe Wednesday night, the Vols are in it but he seems pretty open right now which includes Florida. Conliffe said his trip to Knoxville was fun and that he's looking for the place where he feels most comfortable.
Friday the Vol coaches will roll back into town for a weekend of official visits that will feature 9 commitments along with uncommitted players Aaron Sterling and Tim Jordan. The list could grow a little as we are checking on one other potential new name. The current commitments scheduled to be in town are: James Brown, Matthew Butler, Marquez Bembry, Will Ignont, Solon Page, Shawn Shamburger, Cheyenne Labruzza, Jaquan Henderson, and Jacquez Jones.
Utah State assistant coach Mike Canalas hasn't been formally offered a job to accept by Butch Jones according to those close to Canalas. However, it's only a matter of time. Canalas, as we noted last week in the war room, has been the favorite for the job. He has had two interviews or meetings with the Jones and Vol offensive staff including a visit on Monday. We are told that second visit went well and Canalas left confident about his chances. We think Kevin O'Connell has been the other guy that's garnered the heaviest consideration but O'Connell's personal desire is to be in the NFL, even though right now he doesn't have any offers to be in the league as we understand it.
One interesting note on the timing of Canalas is that if he is hired and starts immediately then Vol quality control coach Walt Wells would have to come off the recruiting road unless there is another change on staff. The only way Wells can be on the road is if Jones doesn't have a complete full time staff. Now, it seems that they could hire Canalas and get around that rule by not having Canalas officially start until a later date.
On the athletic director front, the University of Tennessee made the following statement on Wednesday:
Dr. Davenport arrives on February 15 to begin serving at UT Knoxville’s chancellor. She has said that filling the AD position is one of her top priorities.
The athletic director serves as a member of the chancellor’s cabinet. Dr. Davenport has emphasized the importance of finding the best person for this key role.
The university is in the midst of a procurement process to hire a search firm to assist with the search.
Once that process concludes, UT will release information about the firm that is selected.
At that time, the campus will also announce the members of the search committee and provide a tentative schedule for the search process.
We hope to announce these details soon.
From there - the search committee and the firm will begin working together to begin the national search.
Dave Hart continues to serve as the Athletic Director for the UT Knoxville campus. His retirement date is June 30, 2017.
The message from the University is that the process of hiring an AD isn't close to being done and really isn't even underway. Clearly, Dr. Davenport is going to be involved in the decision. As for timeline, we don't believe it's going to be April or May. We feel it will be done before then. But it's not happening in the next month based on the University statement.
Now, in terms of candidates we don't think Phillip Fumer has lost steam in this race. He's very much a real candidate and could definitely end up being the next AD. The Fulmer camp doesn't seem to think anything is done, but there are plenty of rumblings from people who believe that Fulmer is the favorite. Don't expect Fulmer to do anymore interviews. He told our partners at WVLT that he isn't going to comment on the athletic director opening when he attended the media day for the Border Bowl (Tennessee/Kentucky all-star game) on Wednesday. He will do color commentary for the game this weekend.
But as we have seen this thing could change a lot. It does make you wonder given all the rumors and criticisms why the University didn't issue something much earlier to give a timeline to slow down all of the talk.
