Tennessee Defense Must Create Turnovers to Stay Competitive with Alabama

Tennessee's upstart, rebuilt defense has vastly improved in 2014, but the most frustrating takeaway from coordinator John Jancek's unit is its lack of takeaways.

That has to change immediately if the Vols are going to keep from getting blown off their home field against Alabama on Saturday night at Neyland Stadium.

To slow an offense that features fifth-year senior quarterback Blake Sims, a two-headed running back monster in T.J. Yeldon and Derrick Henry that most NFL teams covet and star receiver Amari Cooper, UT must force turnovers.

Multiple turnovers.

It's a weakness in what has been an otherwise strong unit this season, and coach Butch Jones admitted as much to reporters during his Monday press conference, according to UTSports.com:

"

I thought we [had] many, many opportunities to impact the game Saturday night, and we weren't able to do that. ... That is part of, that is how you win football games. I thought we started fast defensively which we spoke about in the post game press conference. 37 yards in the first seven possessions. But we need to start taking the ball away defensively.

"

The Vols are eighth in the SEC with 14 forced turnovers, and they are also tied for eighth with Florida in turnover differential.

Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images

Those numbers have to improve in Saturday night's rivalry game against the Tide. There's no way UT can beat Bama without creating extra possessions. Then, the offense has got to take over and turn those turnovers into touchdowns.

It's a tall task, but without stealing some scores, UT can't expect to hang with a team as complete as its heated, hated rival to the South. 

The Tide have been susceptible to mistakes this year, losing 11 so far.

Nick Saban is miffed at his team's failure to take care of the football, telling Bleacher Report's Marc Torrence earlier this season: "One of the disappointing things to me about our team is we have made more emphasis on ball security and getting turnovers this year than I can ever remember in all the teams I've been a coach. And we continue to not play the ball correctly and turn the ball over."

Then, the Tide went out the following Saturday and put on a gaffe-fest in a narrow 14-13 win at Arkansas.

The rash of miscues is uncharacteristic of Alabama in recent years, and it has a decisive advantage against UT in that department. In Alabama's current seven-game winning streak over the Vols, the Tide forced UT into 12 turnovers while committing just five.

Now, UT must reverse that trend in a big way Saturday following the Tide's spotless 59-0 win over Texas A&M where Saban's team committed no penalties or turnovers.

Though the Vols have improved dramatically on defense, impacting the game with turnovers hasn't been their forte. Said Jones at his press conference this week:

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We spend so much time on ball disruptions and working the fine details of it. That is what I spoke to our defensive players about is, how do you go from good to great? Everything we do, we want to be elite...That is a mindset of a champion. So the next stage of growth and development defensively is being able to impact the quarterback and take the ball away defensively.

"

That's perhaps the biggest step remaining for a defense that already made huge strides.

It's evident on the scoreboard how takeaways keep this year's young Vols in games.

Against Georgia, the Vols forced two miscues, and they had three interceptions when they played the Gators. Though UT didn't win either game, they were right in the thick of both before losing 35-32 to the Dawgs and 10-9 to UF.

On the road against the third-ranked Ole Miss Rebels, UT didn't force any.

Jones opened his postgame press conference with the topic after the Vols offense committed four in their 34-3 loss to Ole Miss. A team as undermanned and short on depth and talent as UT can't win big games committing them, and they can't win without causing them, either.

Tennessee's speed-based, opportunistic defenders keep putting themselves in position to make big plays, but they've got to break through. Struggling to complete the big, momentum-swinging play has been a deterrent for much of the year.

A memorable time came when star cornerback Cameron Sutton baited Florida quarterback Treon Harris into throwing a would-be fourth-quarter pick-six. Sutton instead slipped just a bit, and though he batted the ball away, an interception returned for a score would have meant a UT win.

Jones told the media there were other squandered chances against the Rebels, according to Volquest.com's Grant Ramey (subscription required): "We thought we had great opportunities for a couple interceptions, we had the right defensive call with the right down-and-distance. You know, robbing a dig route and we are waiting for it to be thrown and it is thrown and we kind of freeze in the moment."

The funny thing is, two weeks ago, the narrative on turnovers was flipped.

It wasn't until the lopsided loss at Ole Miss (against a superior team, by the way) that it became a talking point. But the bottom line is, regardless of how well the Vols have done taking the ball away at times, they've not made the game-changing plays.

Bama, at its worst, has proven this year it's mistake-prone. At their best this past weekend, the Tide manhandled the Aggies partly because of their near-perfect effort. Part of the reason for that game is A&M's defense was a sieve. 

UT's defense is much better than A&M's. But without forcing turnovers and parlaying them into points, the Vols are in for a similar fate.

All stats taken from CFBStats.com, unless otherwise noted.

Brad Shepard covers SEC football and is the Tennessee Lead Writer for Bleacher Report. Follow Brad on Twitter @Brad_Shepard.