{"id":425397,"date":"2026-01-23T17:29:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-23T17:29:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/425397\/"},"modified":"2026-01-23T17:29:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-23T17:29:08","slug":"what-indiana-players-said-about-tennessees-hiring-of-strength-coach-derek-owings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/425397\/","title":{"rendered":"What Indiana Players Said About Tennessee’s Hiring of Strength Coach Derek Owings"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/a>Photo via Indiana Athletics<\/p>\n

One of the off-season priorities for Tennessee football was bringing in a new strength and conditioning coach. Ultimately, Tennessee football landed Indiana\u2019s Derek Owings fresh off a national title with the Hoosiers.<\/p>\n

Owings will now be the highest-paid strength and conditioning coach in college football history, according to Matt Zenitz<\/a>.\u00a0 USC also went after Owings, a 32-year-old, last season, but he turned down the\u00a0opportunity. The pitch and pay day from Josh Heupel and the Vols was enough to leave the reigning national champions, though.<\/p>\n

\u201cPhysical and mental toughness is paramount in everything we do year-round as a program,\u201d Heupel said about the hiring. \u201cNo one understands this better at a championship level than Derek. He will elevate our strength and conditioning program with a relentless mindset and forge strong relationships with our players. He has a proven track record of utilizing modern training methods to maximize speed and strength, while specializing in injury prevention. He also understands what it takes to build an elite nutrition program to ensure our players are set up for on-field success and durability. We are thrilled to welcome Derek and his wife, Riley, to Rocky Top!\u201d<\/p>\n

With the announcement of the hiring, former players at Indiana that Owings coached sounded off in the Instagram comments.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what they said:<\/p>\n

More From RTI:\u00a0ESPN Snubs Tennessee of a Top 100 Player from the 2025 Season<\/a><\/p>\n

WR \u2013 Charlie Becker<\/p>\n

\u201cGotta good one, guess I gotta be a little vol now\ud83e\udd26\u200d\u2642\ufe0f\u201d<\/p>\n

DB \u2013 D\u2019Angelo Ponds<\/p>\n

\u201cHIM\u201d<\/p>\n

OL \u2013 Carter Smith<\/p>\n

\u201cVols got a good one\u2026 gonna miss ya DO\u201d<\/p>\n

DB \u2013 Amare Ferrell<\/p>\n

\u201cbest in the business\u201d<\/p>\n

OL \u2013 Mike Katic<\/p>\n

\u201cBetter make sure Tenn has a good ping pong table \ud83d\ude13\u201d<\/p>\n

DL \u2013 James Carpenter<\/p>\n

\u201cYessssir\ud83e\udd1d\ud83e\udd1d\u201d<\/p>\n

TE \u2013 Zach Horton<\/p>\n

\u201cMotion is medicine!!\u201d<\/p>\n

LB \u2013 Jailin Walker<\/p>\n

\u201cstart stops otw\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c\ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25\u201d<\/p>\n

DB \u2013 Bryson Bonds<\/p>\n

\u201cDa \ud83d\udc10\u201d<\/p>\n

DL \u2013 CJ West<\/p>\n

\u201c\ud83d\udc10\u201d<\/p>\n

WR \u2013 Myles Kendrick<\/p>\n

\u201c\ud83e\udd72\u201d<\/p>\n

LB \u2013 Isaiah Jones<\/p>\n

\u201c\ud83d\udc10\u201d<\/p>\n

DL \u2013 Rolijah Hardy<\/p>\n

\u201c\ud83e\udd1e\ud83c\udffe\ud83e\udd72\u201d<\/p>\n

DB \u2013 Tyrik McDaniel<\/p>\n

\u201c\ud83d\udd25\ud83d\udd25\u201d<\/p>\n

WR \u2013 Miles Cross<\/p>\n

\u201c\ud83d\udcaf\u201d<\/p>\n

QB Coach\/Co-OC \u2013 Chandler Whitmer<\/p>\n

\u201cThe best in game. Do your thing\u00a0@owingsderek\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo via Indiana Athletics One of the off-season priorities for Tennessee football was bringing in a new strength…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":425398,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[202519,399,2652,398,396,397,99,5771,17963],"class_list":{"0":"post-425397","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-derek-owings","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-indiana","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-football","13":"tag-ncaafootball","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-tennessee-football","16":"tag-tennessee-vols"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=425397"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425397\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/425398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=425397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=425397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=425397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}