Pruitt: Inconsistencies, second half haunt Vols in 40-14 loss

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Jeremy Pruitt wasn’t shying away from the reality of his Tennessee football team’s 40-14 season-opening loss to No. 17 West Virginia Saturday at Bank of America Stadium.

West Virginia was the better team. West Virginia deserved what it got. Pruitt’s team, instead, continues as the work in progress that it is.

“If we would’ve won this game, we would’ve been 1-0,” Pruitt said. “What does that mean? Means we’re 1-0. We lost it. We’re 0-1. I’m not real happy about that. But hey, somebody is going to lose and unfortunately today it’s us.

“So we can waller in it, or we can sit here and figure a way to make us better. I think that’s what our guys will try to do.”

Pruitt said West Virginia got better as the game went on — “that’s what a good football team is supposed to do” — made evident in the box score, with the Mountaineers posting 27 points in the second half, after the Vols trailed just 13-7 at the break.

WVU quarterback Will Grier completed 25 of 34 passes for 429 yards and five touchdowns, with four of those scores coming in the second half. Receivers David Sills and Gary Jennings Jr. combined for 13 catches, 253 yards and three scores.

“I thought our guys fought hard the first half,” Pruitt said. “We kind of shot ourselves in the foot a little bit with some penalties, some lack of execution. Against a good team like that, a good quarterback, you can’t give him a whole lot of time.

“I don’t know how much pressure we got on them. They did a really good job protecting the quarterback. He got away from us, extended some plays. The second half, the guy made some throws. Made some throws and (they) made some catches. We got to find a way to get them out.”

Jarrett Guarantano got the nod at quarterback for Tennessee and completed 19 of 25 passes for 172 yards and a touchdown. Sophomore running back Tim Jordan carried 20 times for 118 yards and a score.

The Vols put together a 17-play, 78-yard scoring drive in the second quarter, eating 8:47 off the clock and capped off with a touchdown pass from Guarantano to tight end Dominick Wood-Anderson on fourth-and-goal from the West Virginia 2-yard line.

That cut the lead down to 10-7, before WVU added a field goal on the final play of the first half. The flood gates opened in the second half, with two quick Mountaineer scoring drives early in the third quarter.

“What went from being a very close football game basically, with a little bit lack of execution and execution on their part, it gets out of hand just like that,” Pruitt said. “That’s what happened when you have a team that’s really well coached, has a good trigger man, knows how to protect and he knows what he’s doing with the football. Does a great job.

“You can disguise, try to muddy the looks all you want. That guy has a lot of experience and has some really good receivers on the outside that made some plays.”

Tennessee offense was slow out of the gates, losing yards on first down on each of its first three drives.

“Offensively for us, in the first half, really shot ourselves in the foot,” Pruitt said. “(West Virginia) did a really good job mixing up the looks, stemming around. Way too many negative plays. Got behind the down and distance. I thought our guys did punch it in, put a good drive together, 17 plays, got us in the football game, and done some good things as the game went.”

Pruitt added that were “a lot of positives” to be taken away from the loss and some obvious negatives.

“Probably one of the biggest problems we had is we were inconsistent,” Pruitt said. “We have to be able to do that. If we’re going to be a good football team, you can’t make mental mistakes.

“You have to play with good technique. You have to do a good job communicating. We’ve got some things that we can go back and build on.”

Shared from: 247sports.com

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