University of Tennessee Athletics
Vol All-American Honors About Teamwork
December 16, 2015 | Football
By Brian Rice
KNOXVILLE, Tenn.
UTSports.com
As postseason awards have rolled in, it has once again been the special teams leading the way, including a pair of All-Americans in Evan Berry and Cameron Sutton. Both players said that they were merely a part of a unit that earned the awards.
Berry earned All-American honors from six different sources and was named Southeastern Conference Special Teams Player of the Year for a season that saw him leads the nation with an average of 38.3 yards per kickoff return and three kickoff return touchdowns. His three TDs tied the UT single-season record set by Willie Gault in 1980.
“During the season I really don’t think about things like that, individual accolades,” Berry said. “But after the season, with three touchdowns and 38 yards per return, I knew I had to be getting something.”
Of on those honors was as a Walter Camp All-American, making Berry the first Vol to receive a Walter Camp honor since Berry’s old brother Eric earned the award in back-to-back seasons in 2008 and 2009.
“He was excited,” Berry said of telling his brother, now with the NFL’s Kansas City Chiefs. “He congratulated me, but he humbled me and told me not to be satisfied with any of it. There is a lot more out there to achieve, I can’t be satisfied.”
Sutton was a First-Team All-American as named by the Sporting News and earned Second Team honors from the Football Writers Association of America.
“I wasn’t worried about the accolades or what came after, my job is to play football,” Sutton said. “If all of that comes, we’re excited about it and it’s a plus for your season, but I didn’t do it by myself. If anybody should get an award, it should be the guys around me and the other guys on that unit. They make it happen for me.”
Sutton led the nation in punt return average with 18.7 yards per return and is one of just six Vols to return two punts for a touchdown in a season, the first since Terry Fair in 1996.
Making plays is what Sutton dreamed of doing growing up, and the work ethic he developed then has paid off in a big way now.
“You put it in the perspective of going out and doing it on the field, you visualize something you’ve done for so long, then you go out there and make it happen,” Sutton said. “That’s where it all starts, having fun. I remember as a kid I would do something over and over until I got it right.”
Like Sutton, Berry gave the other 10 players on the return team the credit for his award, one that he wanted to share with those that made it possible.
“I was definitely proud, knowing how hard we work on special teams,” Berry said. “The guys blocking for me wanted to get that award just as bad as I wanted to get it, that helped a lot and I’m proud for them.”
He also knows what the perfect moment to cap the season would be and it has everything to with Gault, a teammate of Berry’s father, James, from 1979-81.
“That’s an easy question,” he said. “It would be great to finish the season by running another kickoff back to break Willie Gault’s record.”
