A “squirrel” will be loose in Bluff City on Saturday. He will be catching footballs.
Marquarius “Squirrel” White is one of several University of Tennessee football players who will participate in the Dayne Davis Football Camp on Saturday at Sullivan East.
Davis, who played football at Sullivan East and is now a redshirt-junior offensive lineman for Tennessee, will host a football camp with several of his teammates and friends for area kids from kindergarten through 12th grades. There will also be an autograph session as well.
While the event was created through the new NIL [Name, Image and Likeness] legislation that has become a significant part of college athletics, that isn’t what led Davis to host this event.
“I wanted to do it more so because as a kid my age I know I would have loved to have the opportunity to be around some Tennessee football players, especially if they are from my area, to be able to be coached by them,” he said. “I just feel like that wasn’t an opportunity afforded to me at that age so I want to be able to afford that opportunity to these kids now for the Northeast Tennessee region and Upper East Tennessee.”
People are also reading…
While registration has been closed, Davis said “walk-ins” will be able to join on Saturday, with the fee for participation being $70 per kid. The Patriot Pride Association from Sullivan East will also benefit from the event that will be held on the sparkling new turf field at the school.
“No doubt, it has been upgraded for sure,” Davis said. “The turf looks amazing. The first time I saw it I was like ‘this isn’t the Patriot Pasture anymore for sure,’ you can’t top that.’”
Davis will split the campers up by grade, with kindergarten through sixth graders receiving instruction from 10-noon, followed by seventh through 12th grades from 1-3 p.m.
“The thought process behind that is you can teach a lot of different skills. The older age group will retain a lot more than that younger age group, of course,” Davis said. “We broke it up into two different groups. A lot of times at camps you will see kids where they have K-12 just all together and you end up getting a sophomore in high school getting paired up with a fifth grader doing something and that is just not beneficial to either kid.
“We wanted to have them in the same age groups, and within those groups there are still age differences obviously so we will have them subdivided within those groups. We will try to get them paired up with the kids their age and their size and be able to give them their best work in for those two hours that we have them.”
The instructors are University of Tennessee football players, including Davis, White, quarterback Hendon Hooker, running back Jabari Small, safety Trevon Flowers, linemen Jackson Lampley and Jerome Carvin, along with tight end and Dobyns-Bennett graduate Charlie Browder.
“We are going to do a lot of agility and speed training drills and after that we will do a lot of fundamental stuff and then we will go into some more skill-based stuff after that,” he said.
Austin Lewis, who transferred from East Tennessee State to Tennessee, will also be involved, along with Sullivan East alumus Clayton Ivester, who is currently playing at ETSU.
“I have got a player for every position there, any position that a kid wants to play,” Davis said. “If he is in high school and already determined his position, we will have a player there and we will break those kids up in each position as well for the more skill-based stuff at the end.
“The fundamental stuff is going to be more running from group to group and the skill-based stuff will be based off position.”
An autograph session will be open to the public from noon to 1 p.m. The $20 fee is included in the camp fee for participants, while tickets for autographs only are still available.
““That is autographs from each player for whatever you want signed so that is worth the money, especially with the lineup I have got there,” Davis said.
***
Much is expected from Tennessee football this season, a once-proud program that is trying to reclaim its glory days. The Volunteers rebounded from a 3-7 mark in 2020 to a 7-6 record last season, scoring as many as 62 points at Missouri, while falling in close games against Pittsburgh, Mississippi and Purdue in the TransPerfect Music City Bowl.
“It is really exciting any time you have as big a turnaround as we did last year, but you still can’t get complacent with 7-6 obviously,” Davis said. “Just looking at a few games last year - Alabama, Florida, Pitt - just those games, even the bowl game against Purdue, being so close and just not being able to execute in the end to finish it out.
“That is what we are really looking forward to being able to get ourselves into this year and just execute in the end.
One of the reasons for that optimism is Hooker, who transferred from Virginia Tech last season, won the job and is now considered one of the top quarterbacks in the nation.
“What an athlete. Just such a good athlete, a crazy decision maker, just an elite guy on the field and an elite guy off the field too,” Davis said. “He is such a good guy and one of my best friends so I am looking forward to what he does this year again.”
The 6-foot-7, 325-pound Davis had offers from several NCAA FCS schools coming out of Sullivan East, but an offer by former Tennessee head coach Jeremy Pruitt led him to Knoxville instead of places like Austin Peay, Southeast Missouri State or Tennessee Tech.
“Obviously growing up in Bluff City I have always been a Vols’ fan, my family has always been Vols’ fans,” Davis said. “It was always a dream to come here and of course I had come to a summer camp my senior year up here, a prospect camp, and Coach Pruett had offered me a preferred walk-on spot out of that camp.
“I just really made my mind up there. I was like this is an opportunity I can’t pass up and have bet on myself since then to put in the work to get where I have and keep my head down and go even further.”
Davis, who was nominated for the Burlsworth Trophy last season – which goes to America’s top college football that started as a walk-on - played in eight games, earning three starts against Alabama, Vanderbilt and Purdue. He played 223 offensive snaps and allowed just four pressures, according to the Tennessee football website. He saw a high of 80 snaps in a close loss to Ole Miss, and allowed no sacks or pressures against Alabama.
He is competing for a starting position for the upcoming season, which begins on Sept. 1 with Ball State, having worked at right guard and tackle in the spring and preseason drills.
“Obviously anytime you have an opportunity to win one of those jobs has always been a dream,” Davis said. “I am just keeping my head down and working for it and how the dominos fall is how they fall.”
***
Davis, who has two more years of eligibility after this season, is excited to bring a piece of Tennessee football to Sullivan East.
“This camp is to benefit the Patriot Pride Association at Sullivan East,” he said. “We are just looking to have a great event out at East. I really appreciate the staff, Andy Hare and Kim Carrier and J.C. Simmons, for letting me come back and do this at East.”
This is the first year, but won’t be the last.
“I have got this year and two more years of eligibility,” he said. “That is what we are planning, just to make it an annual event. Hopefully it grows and gets even bigger next year.”
bwoodson@bristolnews.com | Twitter: @BHCWoodson | (276) 645-2543