Tennessee linebacker Jalen Reeves-Maybin has had surgery on his injured shoulder and will miss the remainder of the season.
photo by Tennessee Athletics
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. -- Tennessee football coach Butch Jones and senior linebacker Jalen Reeves-Maybine spoke to reporters at Tuesday's football press conference.
No.
18 Tennessee (5-2, 2-2 SEC) has its bye week this week. The Vols will next face South Carolina (2-4, 1-4 SEC) on Oct. 29 at Williams-Brice Stadium with a 7:15 p.m. ET broadcast on either ESPN, ESPN2 or SEC Network.
Butch Jones |
Jones and his coaching staff are approaching the bye week with a sense of urgency. The Vols will practice today, Wednesday and Thursday and are committed to maintaining the same focus in their work in the training room, in film study and on the practice field.
"In terms of the open week, same thing, same approach. We are looking to be 1-0. We have to make tremendous improvement this week and we have to have a great, great, great sense of urgency in everything that we do. From the training room to personal growth and development to fundamentals to special teams improvement, the way I look at it is we are guaranteed five one-week seasons and that's kind of the approach that we take. We can't get to those until we win the open week.
There's a lot that goes into it, so the sense of urgency by everyone in our football organization has to be heightened. We have to attack this bye week. We have players in new roles and it's going to be a race to maturity. We are going to have some individuals step up in terms of maturity, competitive maturity and everything that we are doing. Like I always remind our football team, it's one thing to be ready, it's another thing to be prepared. It's two totally different things. Everybody thinks they're ready, but are you prepared? It's a body of work that you put in during the week that really shows up on game day. So we are taking a game week approach to this bye week, again with great intensity and great effort."
Jalen Reeves-Maybin | Senior Linebacker
Reeves-Maybin spoke about his decision to seek treatment for his injured shoulder that will keep him sidelined for the rest of the 2016 season.
"I had tried to play. I got hurt in the Ohio game and I tried to play in the Florida game. I probably spent six hours a day in treatment that week - every day, six hours a day. I wasn't going to be able to play like that at all. There was a couple of different surgery options that I had, but I just had to make my decision. I felt like, with the condition I was in, I wouldn't be able to help the team."
Rumors were spreading around social media on Tuesday that tailback Alvin Kamara might have suffered a knee injury that could sideline him for two to four weeks, possibly longer.
More Sound Bites
Butch Jones
(On Jalen Reeves-Maybin)
"I'm just really really proud of him and the man that he has become and everything that he has brought to our football program. He still has a major role on this football team. He is a captain and even though he can't help us win on the field, he can definitely help us win off the field."
Jalen Reeves-Maybine
(On what playing at the University of Tennessee has meant to him)
"This has really been a fun life experience for me. Just to see where I program go from where it was when I got here to the condition it is in now, playing on CBS 3:30 every week, I think it's a testament to all of the work that the coaching staff put in but also the guys who came in with my recruiting class and the year after us. We all had a mission and I feel like we are well on our way to accomplishing our mission."
(Contact Larry Fleming at larryfleming44@gmail.com and on Twitter @larryfleming44)