An update on three injured Tennessee players heading into matchup against South Carolina

For the first time this season, Tennessee is set to have its preseason All-SEC center.

Cooper Mays is expected to make his season debut for the Vols when they play South Carolina today, sources tell On3. Starting running back Jaylen Wright and wide receiver Ramel Keyton, who both left Tennessee’s game against UTSA last week with injuries, are also set to play, sources tell On3.

Mays had missed the first four games of the season as he worked back from an August surgery. He’s now in his third year as the Vols’ starting center and was part of Tennessee’s offensive line group that was a semifinalist for the Joe Moore Award last season.

Vols head coach Josh Heupel had shared in recent days that he was hopeful regarding Mays’ availability for this game.

“Practiced really well,” Heupel said of Mays on Thursday. “Like those other guys that I talked about, we’ll ensure that through tomorrow and then obviously game day that they’re ready to go compete at the level that you need to in this one. South Carolina’s big, strong, physical, explosive up front. So hopefully we’ll have him locked and loaded and ready to roll.”

Wright and Keyton both sustained injuries during Tennessee’s win over UTSA last week.

Wright, who has started each of the Vols’ first four games at running back, leads the team with 312 rushing yards, including 296 that came in Tennessee’s first three games against Virginia, Austin Peay and Florida. Wright led the Vols with 875 rushing yards last season and was second on the team with 10 touchdown runs.

Keyton leads Tennessee with 205 receiving yards and three touchdown catches. He has recorded a touchdown catch in each of the Vols’ last three games. It comes after he ranked third on Tennessee last season with 562 receiving yards and second with five receiving touchdowns.

Heupel had classified both as game-time decisions, although he did indicate Thursday that he felt “really good” about their status heading into the game.

Tennessee enters the matchup against South Carolina as a 12-point favorite. The Vols will be looking for revenge after their 63-38 loss to the Gamecocks last season.

South Carolina, which is 2-2, is coming off a 37-30 victory over Mississippi State last week.

“We have a big challenge on Saturday night,” Gamecocks head coach Shane Beamer said earlier this week. “One, we know it will be a hostile crowd in Neyland Stadium that we’re going into. That’s what you want to play in and coach in is environments like that. That’s SEC football. We’re excited about that aspect of it. Coach Heupel has done a great job with this year’s team. Obviously a fantastic season last year and they’ve picked up right where they left off. Essentially, they had one bad half of football and that was against Florida a couple of weeks ago. But other than that, they’ve really been operating at a high-level.”