Report: Tennessee to hire former Conference USA assistant to staff

Tennessee is reportedly adding an experienced coach to its staff.

The Volunteers are working to hire former Charlotte special teams coordinator Maxwell “Max” Thurmond as an analyst, according to FootballScoop’s John Brice. Thurmond also worked at Jacksonville State during his coaching career.

Thurmond got his coaching start at Jacksonville State after playing for the Gamecocks from 1996-2000. He worked there from 2001-12 before going West Alabama from 2014-15. He served as the linebackers coach and special teams coordinator, which allowed him to work with Tyreek Hill. Hill, of course, now stars for the Kansas City Chiefs as Patrick Mahomes’ top target.

From there, Thurmond went to Austin Peay from 2016-17 and was Central Arkansas’ defensive coordinator in 2018. He worked at Charlotte in 2019 and returned to Jacksonville State in 2020 as special teams coordinator. After John Grass’ resignation, Thurmond became the Gamecocks’ interim head coach this past season.

The news comes after Tennessee decided to promote analyst Kelsey Pope to wide receivers coach, On3’s Matt Zenitz learned.

Pope spent one season at Gardner-Webb and another at Tennessee Tech, serving as the wide receivers coach at both programs. While with Tennessee Tech, Pope helped the Golden Eagles post the second-best total offensive output in program history in 2019, with the receivers — particularly, Metrius Fleming — playing a huge role in the offensive boost.

Fleming, one of the wide receivers in Pope’s position group, earned four newcomer of the week awards in OVC play and he was a second-team all-OVC honoree. He caught 47 passes for 629 receiving yards and three touchdowns and added more than 1,200 all-purpose yards.

Pope also had previous coaching stints as an assistant receivers coach at Division II Shorter (Ga.) University and as a running backs coach at Ohio Northern.

Tennessee went 7-6 in Josh Heupel’s first season in Knoxville. He led the Volunteers to a Music City Bowl appearance, where they fell to Purdue in overtime.

On3’s Simon Gibbs contributed to this report.