University of Tennessee at Chattanooga defensive lineman Josh Freeman chases University of Tennessee quarterback Justin Worley on Saturday in Neyland Stadium.KNOXVILLE - Six games into the season, Butch Jones is still struggling to get a read on his Tennessee football team.
That was before his quarterback actually kept the ball and ran for a couple of touchdowns.
Paced by Justin Worley's five touchdowns and helped by some big plays on defense and special teams, the Volunteers bounced back from last week's loss to Florida with a comfortable 45-10 win against visiting UT-Chattanooga in front of 93,097 on a dreary Saturday afternoon at Neyland Stadium.
"Day one after the loss last week, he came in and he was visibly upset from the loss," Worley said of Jones, Tennessee's second-year coach. "It was all, 'We're moving on to this week. We can't worry about that. It's new week and a new game, another step in the road to getting to a bowl game, which is our goal.'
"I'd credit him for getting us ready for this game."
Seven days after committing three costly turnovers against the Gators, Worley tossed two touchdown passes to Johnathon Johnson and a third to Marquez North. But the quarterback keeping the ball, which has been quite the topic of conversation in Knoxville this season, for a pair of short touchdowns were more out of character for the senior.
"He's heard Jimmy Hyams all week," Jones quipped, referring to a Knoxville radio show host.
"It was there, and he took it. I thought Justin was much more aggressive in his mindset, in his thinking and the way he played the game. He played confident tonight, and that's what we're going to need [from] him as we continue to go forward.
"We don't need a home run from the quarterback postion; we just need 4 yards."
Worley, who completed 19 of 24 passes for 198 yards, bounced off a UTC defender on his 8-yard score in the second quarter, and his 1-yard score in the third quarter made it 38-3 and opened the door for the Vols (3-3) to empty their bench.
"I got a lot of crap from them, I'll tell you that," Worley said of his teammates' reactions to his rushing scores.
"Their eyes were always inside on the running back," he added, "and I felt like if I pulled it I could get outside and confuse them with me running the ball."
After surrendering five sacks to Florida last week, the Vols allowed five again to the Mocs' respected defensive line.
Jones said the sacks resulted from a combination of Tennessee's offensive linemen getting beat one on one, running backs missing blocks or Worley holding the ball too long.
"We take pride in winning our one-on-one matchups," center Mack Crowder said, "and we can't be getting beat like that, especially against Chattanooga, but really any opponent. It just comes down to effort and pride, really, at the end of the day.
"We're keeping our heads up. We know we have a lot of work to do, but we're coming in every day and we're going to just work. That's all we can do. We're going to continue to work and continue to grow."
Tennessee held UTC to 40 yards of offense and two first downs in the first half, and the Mocs' lone points for the game came following Keionta Davis's strip-sack of Worley deep in Tennessee territory and against the Vols' defensive backups.
"I kind of knew we would come out there and make a bunch of stops," said Vols defensive back Justin Coleman. "That was our expectation, is to get three-and-outs every time we touch the field. They're going to make their plays, and we came out and executed on the majority of them."
Six of UTC's 14 possessions were three-and-outs.
"The defense, we were just flying around and having fun," freshman defensive end Derek Barnett said. "When we do that, we play good football. Even if we mess up, we run hard to the ball when we're flying around."
Barnett's fumble recovery and Coleman's interception set up Tennessee for short touchdown drives, and a trio of special-teams plays -- Cam Sutton's punt return, Evan Berry's kickoff return and Cortez McDowell's recovery of a muffed punt -- did the same, as the Vols had scoring drives of 38, 20, 19, 16 and 14 yards.
Tennessee was careful with Jalen Hurd's ailing shoulder by giving the freshman tailback two carries on the first three offensive snaps and sitting him the rest of the game, and tailback Marlin Lane didn't play at all with an ankle injury.
That left freshman tailback Derrell Scott and a walk-on Maryland transfer to combine for 19 carries, and Tennessee finished with 123 rushing yards on 42 attempts for 2.9 yards per carry.
A healthy Hurd should help the running game, but the Vols enter a three-game stretch with trips to Ole Miss and South Carolina sandwiching a visit from Alabama with persistent concerns regarding their offensive line.
"We're going," Jones said, "into a tough stretch here."
It ought to teach him about his team.
Contact Patrick Brown at pbrown@timesfreepress.com.