How Nathan Leacock turned one of Tennessee's worst plays against Chattanooga into one of the best
Gaston Moore took the snap, looked to his left and delivered a pass to a slanting Dayton Sneed. The ball was in front of the receiver, though, just out of arms length.
Waiting there for it was Chattanooga linebacker Kobe Joseph, picking off the pass and taking off the other way. That’s when Nathan Leacock started the chase down.
Tennessee’s redshirt freshman receiver had lined up left of Sneed as the outside receiver on the play and was roughly five yards behind Joseph when he took off with the interception.
Joseph started at the Chattanooga 20-yard line. Leacock chased him down at the Tennessee 20, finally forcing him out of bounds at the 10.
Up Next: No. 14 Tennessee vs. No. 24 N.C. State, Saturday, 7:30 p.m. ET, ABC
One of Tennessee’s worst plays in the 69-3 win over Chattanooga on Saturday turned into one of the best because of Leacock’s hustle. On Tuesday, wide receivers coach Kelsey Pope couldn’t say enough about it.
“That is what you want to see as a head coach,” Pope said, “as a receivers coach, shoot, as an AD, because that gives you a glimpse of what your football team looks like.”
Leacock was a highly rated four-star prospect in the 2023 recruiting cycle, ranked No. 45 overall in the On3 ratings. He was the No. 6 wide receiver in the class and the No. 3 overall player in the state of North Carolina.
But he didn’t catch a single pass as a freshman last season. Before his hustle play, he didn’t have a catch on Saturday either.
“That is a kid who maybe he didn’t play as many snaps as he wanted to early,” Pope said. “ … As soon as the pick was thrown, he didn’t bat an eye, he turned and sprinted in the opposite direction to go stop a touchdown.”
‘We kept those guys out of the end zone and it is solely from that play’
Chattanooga gained just three yards on the offensive drive that followed, then attempted a 25-yard field goal that went wide left.
What looked like a Pick-6 only moments earlier had turned into a Tennessee stop after Leacock refused to give up on a play in a game his team led by 52 points in the fourth quarter.
“We kept those guys out of the end zone and it is solely from that play,” Pope said. “That is a kid who has battled injuries. That is a kid who has gone through adversity and he is fighting like crazy to go make a play and add value on the field.
“That shows you what type of culture you’ve got when a guy like Nathan Leacock — a young guy — he is exemplifying that. You have to imagine what that building looks like every day.”
Josh Heupel showed the play in a team meeting, a moment Pope described as “awesome” and a play that described “who Nate is.”
“He is a fighter and he is going to keep swinging until the very last second,” Pope said. “That is awesome to see.”
