Russ Huesman

Russ Huesman still doesn’t know a whole lot about what kind of players he has on his University of Tennessee at Chattanooga football team. But the Mocs’ new coach is getting to know them as people and said he likes what he’s seen and heard so far.

Last Tuesday and Wednesday he held one-on-one meetings with all of the returning Mocs — each visit lasted about 15 minutes — and Huesman said each conversation was productive and informative.

“It was really good; they’re good kids and I was impressed with all of them,” Huesman said. “I wanted to know about mom and dad, brothers and sisters, why they chose UTC, do they like it here? When you recruit them and make the home visits, you see the brother, sister, mom, dad, and when you recruit them you know why they came here. It was pretty interesting talking to them all.”

Huesman said he’s following the advice of his old boss at the University of Richmond, Mike London.

“Mike told me — he said, ‘If I can give you any advice at all, find the time to meet with them and spend time and get to know them,’ and I think that’s what I did,” Huesman said.

Despite the fact that the football coach was meeting with his players, Huesman said the game was never one of the topics discussed.

“I talked zero football with them — zero,” he said. “I didn’t want to know how good they were, what kind of year they had; I just wanted to know about them. That’s what Mike had told me, to just have them all in and talk to them and learn about them.”

It has been nearly a month since Huesman was hired, but he said he has watched hardly any video on the Mocs. This is crunch time for recruiting, and he said it was more important that he and his staff study tape of recruits than of the current players.

“We’ve got these kids and we’ve got time to learn everything we need to know about them,” he said. “Our coordinators know what they want to do and it’s just a matter of getting everybody on the same page, and that won’t take long.

“I know some people would go ahead and watch film immediately, but we looked at (depth) numbers and needs and started recruiting.”

Gipson injures knee

Freshman offensive lineman Nick Gipson suffered a knee injury while working out Friday, Huesman said. Gipson had an MRI on Friday, but Huesman said he did not know the extent of the injury.

Gipson started the Mocs’ opener at Oklahoma but had limited game action the rest of the season.

“We’ll know more in the next couple of days, but I guess the good news is that if it’s serious then he’s got a lot of time to recover before next season,” Huesman said.

Hazard hangs it up

One person Huesman didn’t visit with last week was junior wide receiver/returner Jordan Hazard, who has decided not to play next season. Hazard had said following the Mocs’ last game of the season that he was debating whether to return.

Huesman said he never talked to the 5-foot-9 wideout, but wide receivers coach Jason McManus had informed him of the decision.

Hazard had just 11 receptions last season but led the Mocs with 1,138 all-purpose yards thanks to a combined 62 punt and kickoff returns. He had just two touchdowns, but both were memorable: a 62-yard reception in the first quarter at Florida State and a 76-yarder against Georgia Southern.

Former Mocs on move

Two players who ended their UTC careers in 2007, cornerback Brandon Golder and offensive lineman Sam Bentley, recently signed with arenafootball2 league teams. Golder will play for the Peoria Pirates and Bentley joined the Boise Burn.

Former UTC defensive line coach Vantz Singletary, who left the Mocs following the 2007 season for the same job at the University of Buffalo, was hired last week to be the inside linebackers coach for the San Francisco 49ers, who are coached by his uncle, former Chicago Bears great Mike Singletary.