Wolf Shafer knew that Jaden Nelson, who was part of the 2025 signing class for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga football program, had the makings of a good addition to the team before Nelson officially joined the Mocs.
Why? Nelson, an all-region selection his final two seasons at Tift County High School in South Georgia, was asking the right questions long before he arrived at UTC.
“He was bugging me before he got here about getting on Zooms and learning the defense,” said Shafer, the safeties coach for the Mocs. “That held true when he showed up. He lives in my office.”
Said Nelson: “I was just trying to be prepared and separate myself from everybody else and coming up here ready to work and grind, learn my spot.”
That preparation had him in line to play right away in the defensive backfield as a freshman last season, and Nelson appeared in the first three games, but an injury in a 63-0 home win over Stetson on Sept. 13 sidelined him for the rest of the year.