Larry Scott
Mike CanalesKNOXVILLE - When it comes to making changes to his staff, Tennessee football coach Butch Jones often opts for familiarity and continuity, particularly on offense.
The latest moves for the Volunteers certainly reflect the philosophy.
Tennessee recently finalized the promotion of Larry Scott to offensive coordinator and the addition of Mike Canales - a long-time colleague of Jones whose coaching career twice crossed paths with Scott at South Florida - as quarterbacks coach.
"It's just not football, but in anything in life," Scott said last week, "if you keep changing the pieces all the time, how does anything ever get better? How does anything ever grow? How does it ever become what it needs to become to be successful? Continuity and the idea of something being consistent is critical to the development of anything when you're talking about measuring success."
Most coaches often hire assistants with whom they're familiar, and while Jones has done that in his four seasons leading the Vols, it hasn't been the case every time. Prior to hiring them at Tennessee, Jones never had worked with Scott, defensive coordinator Bob Shoop, linebackers coach Tommy Thigpen or running backs coach Robert Gillespie, and new defensive backs coach Charlton Warren also had no ties to Jones or Shoop when he joined the staff from North Carolina.
However, when offensive coordinator Mike Bajakian left after the 2014 season, Jones opted for a familiar hire in Mike DeBord, whom he worked for at Central Michigan. Two years later, Jones stressed there would be no drastic changes to his offense weeks before staying in house for DeBord's replacement.
Though the three new coaches were introduced last week, Jones has yet to discuss or explain the hires because he hasn't done any media interviews since Tennessee beat Nebraska in the Music City Bowl on Dec. 30.
"One of the first things we make sure that everybody understand is it's Tennessee's offense," Scott said. "We're going to take the personnel that we have and we're going to evaluate it top to bottom. We're going to always look at what our strengths are, and we're going to always play to those strengths and do the best that we can to make sure we're putting ourselves on a week-by-week basis in position to win.
"Whether that makes it look a little different, some of it may look the same, that's all left out there to be determined over time, and we're just going to take it step by step and build it from the bottom up."
The relationship between Canales and Jones dates back two decades, and the comfort level with Canales and his college coaching experience, albeit at lower-profile programs, certainly played a factor in Jones going in that direction instead of hiring Chris Weinke or Kevin O'Connell, both quarterbacks coaches for NFL teams.
"I've kind of watched what he's done from West Virginia and then Central Michigan and at Cincinnati," Canales said. "There's a lot of different styles. You can go pro style. You can go spread. You can go multiple. I've seen how Coach Jones's has gone, but let's be honest, this offense has done some great things this year.
"They were top three (in the Southeastern Conference) in almost every category offensively. That's something you can build on and keep going. If the kids like it and it's contagious, they want to keep doing it. I think that's something we can build on."
Though Scott has never been a coordinator, the tight ends coach apparently showed Jones enough working alongside DeBord and other assistants as part of what he called a "collaborative effort" coaching Tennessee's offense during his first year in Knoxville.
In addition to his involvement with the game plan each week, Scott sat next to DeBord in the coaching booth during games, which he said was another "preparation vehicle" for him because he was closely involved as the Vols evaluated making in-game adjustments.
"I'm very confident in the decisions that our head coach makes, first and foremost," Scott said, "and second I'm confident in all of the guys that we have in our program, the players, the coaches and myself. Right now that is the focus and that's all I can worry about. I can't worry about any of those other things. I don't control those other things, and all I can do is focus on the task at hand and what's important to us and moving the program forward."
Contact Patrick Brown at pbrown@timesfreepress.com.