KNOXVILLE - Robert Gillespie was busier this preseason than a few months ago, and not just because Tennessee's opener is drawing near.
The Volunteers running backs coach went from having two players on scholarship at that position during spring practice in March and April to five in August.
Jalen Hurd and Alvin Kamara are the backfield's headliners, but Gillespie has been grateful for the chance to groom Ralph David Abernathy IV (a fifth-year senior who previously played at Cincinnati), as well as freshmen John Kelly and Joe Young.
Now Gillespie is eager to see what the group can do this season, which kicks off at 4 p.m. EDT Saturday at Nissan Stadium in Nashville, where the 25th-ranked Vols will play Bowling Green.
Tennessee sophomore Jalen Hurd is the leading returning rusher for the Vols, who like their other options at running back this season as well. Hurd and Alvin Kamara are the top two running backs, but freshman John Kelly and Ralph David Abernathy IV are also likely to contribute."In this league, it's about what group can make it the duration of the season and stay healthy. That all starts with having great depth," Gillespie said last week. "Just having those three or four extra bodies in there to get reps in practice, but also guys that I think will be able to contribute throughout the season, it's always great for us as an offense.
"In this league, if you've got three NFL guys in your room, three out of five or six, you've got it going. I think right now we're kind of at that point where we've got the kind of guys it takes in this league to make plays and help us to be explosive running the ball. I think it's going to be fun this year for Coach (Mike) DeBord and us as an offense to sit back and try to figure out ways we can get guys the ball."
DeBord enters his first season as Tennessee's offensive coordinator confident in his running game, and for good reason.
At his disposal at running back are Hurd, the 240-pound sophomore who is poised for a big season after gaining 899 yards on 190 carries in 2014, and Kamara, who has waited two years for his chance to perform on this stage after redshirting in a loaded backfield at Alabama and playing a season of junior college football.
The 5-foot-9, 212-pound Kelly, despite not arriving on campus until July, looks like he'll be the Vols' No. 3 back. Abernathy, who has added 20 pounds since coming to Knoxville and now weighs 188, will play more of a specialty role. He was familiar with what the Vols were doing offensively because of playing for Butch Jones during the Tennessee head coach's tenure at Cincinnati.
"I don't want to give too many things away, so I'll just say that he's doing a heck of a job right now," DeBord said of Abernathy. "He's played in this offense, so terminology-wise, he stepped right in. That was a big advantage for him. He's a great competitor, and he had a really good scrimmage last week. He's a guy that will continue to be a great role player for us."
Tennessee enters the season with some concern about its offensive line, though, as that unit went into the final weekend before the season still unsettled. Jones said Thursday the Vols have a good idea which 10 linemen will make the travel roster, but a couple of positions in the starting lineup were undecided.
Jones suggested last week the Vols might use a game-by-game rotation this season, but DeBord, who has spent as much time with the offensive line in practice as any other position group (including the quarterbacks), said a day later he'd prefer to "settle with those five and let them play."
DeBord has been pleased with the physicality of the line.
"I like it. I like where our offensive line is," he said. "I like that every day they've gotten better. Coach (Don) Mahoney has done a great job of working with their footwork, their pad level, leverage - all that. That group just gets better every day, and that's all we ask of them. We said, 'Hey, just continue to push it.' We've got guys that are doing that and getting better, so I like where we're at."
In 2014, Tennessee averaged 146.4 rushing yards per game, 13th among the Southeastern Conference's 14 schools, and was one of two teams in the conference to average fewer than 4 yards per carry.
Of course, those numbers suffered from the 43 sacks the Vols allowed. Unlike the NFL, sack yardage is subtracted from the rushing total in college football. The 305 yards Tennessee lost on sacks made it the third-worst Football Bowl Subdivision program in that category.
Without the sack yardage, Tennessee averaged nearly 170 rushing yards per game, and with Josh Dobbs at quarterback for the final six games of the season, the Vols averaged 208.5 yards in those contests.
"We've got great running backs with great speed and quickness and things like that," DeBord said. "We just talked to our offensive line: All we've got to do is get on guys and stay on guys. That's the biggest thing, because our backs are going to make people miss and get extra yardage. Our backs add a lot to our run game."
Contact Patrick Brown at pbrown@timesfreepress.com.