Tennessee’s wide receiver play on the field in 2024 was arguably the biggest surprised of the season as the
Chris Brazzell,
Mike Matthews and
Braylon Staley became the first Vol trio to have over 700 yards receiving in the same year.
For wide receivers coach
Kelsey Pope, success this year wasn’t just on the field with his current receivers, it’s also the work he has gotten done on the recruiting trail as well with the signing of
Tristen Keys,
Tyreek King, and
Legend Bey. We will see what happens with Bey over the next couple of weeks.
Landing the signatures wasn’t all Pope’s work as Tennessee’s entire staff recruits and there’s money involved with revenue sharing and third party NIL. However, Pope work on the recruiting trail this year is certainly noteworthy.
“That’s my dog,” 5-star signee Tristen Keys said. “Since day one when I first met him on my first trip to Knoxville, that’s been my guy. He has good energy. He’s young. He can relate not just about football, but about life man. He’s one of those coaches that is a people person. Great father, great husband, he’s a great person besides being a great coach and we know how he can coach.”
Added
Josh Heupel, “Kelsey did a great job with him. Our staff did with TK. His family, dynamic wide receiver, super loose at the line of scrimmage. He has the ability to stretch it vertically but it has ball in hand value as well. He has the ability to go attack the football. Dynamic player that is really excited about being here at Tennessee and we’re excited to have him for sure.”
Pope started his career at Tennessee as an offensive analyst. He was promoted to receivers coach in March off 2022 and the Alabama native has certainly settled into his role as his receivers have gotten better as has his recruiting prowess.
“I think showing those families and those student athletes, you got to show them the real youth. I think it’s so easy in recruiting to just give them all the highlights and the success stories. Like you got to give them the stories where you fail. You got to give them the stories where you’ve dealt with adversity. Because I think ultimately like perfection people can’t relate to. I think once recruits and families, they see the success automatically when they come here. I think once you give them a couple of those stories about, you know, we had to deal with adversity or you weren’t successful, how you battle back, I think that makes you relatable. And I think nowadays kids want more than anything in recruiting— they want to know you can develop and they want to know you can get them better, but they also want to know you care like about them in society and you got to be relatable in order to do that. And I think that’s what’s helped us in recruiting.”
Wednesday that “help” paid off big time for Pope and the Vols. Tennessee