wide receivers coach Kelsey Pope says UT will need to be “aware” of Arkansas Razorbacks defensive back Doneiko Slaughter on Saturday night in Fayetteville.
Slaughter is a former Volunteer who transferred to Arkansas this past offseason after spending the first four seasons of his career with Tennessee. The Georgia native is obviously quite familiar with many of the wide receivers on the Vols’ roster, competing against most of them in practice over the last several years.
During an appearance on Vol Calls earlier this week, Pope noted that Tennessee will need to be aware of Slaughter on the field, but he stopped short of calling it an “advantage” for Arkansas.
“I think seeing Doneiko over there is something you definitely have to be aware of,” said Pope. “I wouldn’t call it an advantage. As far as those guys, as a unit, they’ve got really good length. They’re a really athletic bunch. And they play extremely hard. They’ll press. They’ll play some different coverages on the back end, show you some different looks. It’ll be a really good test for our guys to be able to see how we fare against them on Saturday.”
Slaughter likely knows the tendencies of some of Tennessee’s wide receivers. But the opposite is true as well — Tennessee’s wide receivers will have that same familiarity with Slaughter.
Arkansas head coach Sam Pittman named Slaughter and former Vols offensive lineman Addison Nichols this week for the game against Tennessee. I’m sure both players will have some extra juice against their former team, but I think we’ll see Tennessee match that energy on Saturday night in Fayetteville.