Jackson Ross had a rough start to his first full season at Tennessee against Virginia, but he eventually turned into a dependable member of the Vols’ special teams unit. The 24-year-old Australian punter was named Tennessee’s only selection to the SEC All-Freshman Team on Thursday, reaping one of the benefits of his outstanding redshirt freshman campaign in 2023. The accolade placed him in very good company; Dustin Colquitt was the last Vols punter to be named an all-freshmen by the league in 2001.
When Tennessee added Ross to its 2022 recruiting class last summer, it was a latecomer to the American college football scene’s movement of Australian punters. Ross had moved to a new nation just weeks prior to the start of the previous season.
Ross, who redshirted the previous season, averaged 42.8 yards on 48 punts, good for sixth place in the SEC and third place nationally among freshmen punters. He also contributed to Tennessee’s fifth-place finish in the SEC and twentieth-place finish in the country in net punting.
Ross had nine punts of 50 yards or more, and he pinned opponents inside their 20-yard line eighteen times. His longest punt of the season was a 71-yarder against Alabama in October. In that game, Ross broke the program record when he totaled 266 yards on five punts for a 53.2-yard average. This is the best single-game average (minimum five punts) in Tennessee history, surpassing Jimmy Colquitt’s two 53.0-yard averages (Auburn 1983 and LSU 1982).
His punt of 71 yards was the Vols’ longest since 2018.
Ross, who could kick with both his right and left foot and was effective with his Aussie-style rollout punts, was a key part of Tennessee’s win against Texas A&M in October, his punt down to the Aggies 1-yard line starting a sequence that ended in Dee Williams returning a punt for what proved to be the winning touchdown.
Tennessee allowed just 5 net yards on seven punt returns during the entire season, which ranked third in the SEC and fifth in the FBS.
