Injured wide receiver Von Pearson has missed Tennessee’s last two games with a high ankle sprain. The former JUCO All-American suffered the injury during a breakout performance against Arkansas State in Week 2. But head coach Butch Jones believes that the wide receiver is ahead of his expected schedule for recovery.

“Right now, Von Pearson is a little bit ahead of schedule,” Jones said during his weekly press conference. “He’s ahead of Josh Smith at this particular time. I’ll know more later in the week. It’ll be on going. We put them, the last couple weeks, we put them in protective casts just to make sure they didn’t tweak it or all that. Now, they’re heavy into their rehabilitation, so I’ll know a little bit more as the week progresses. Right now, I’d say that Von is ahead of Josh in terms of recovery.”

Josh Smith is also recovering from a high ankle sprain. The sophomore suffered his injury the week after Pearson during Tennessee’s 34-10 loss to Oklahoma in Week 3. Smith showed improvement in his second season before getting injured, improving on dropped passes. In their absence, No. 1 receiver Marquez North has seen double coverage and his targets have suffered.

“Anytime you take Josh Smith and Von Pearson out of your offense, it sets you back,” Jones said. “We have very capable players. We have a little bit of depth, but not as much depth as everyone that recruits against us at the wide receiver position. We need more depth, but anytime you take Josh Smith and Von Pearson out of the offense you’re going to suffer because they are talented players. We really missed their presence Saturday.

“The volume of repetitions that we want to play at the tempo we want to play, the old school days of 21 personnel, the huddle, your wide outs take all the reps­­–that doesn’t happen. You need to continue to put individuals in, and we didn’t have that luxury in the Georgia game.”

Tennessee will host Florida at noon Saturday at Neyland Stadium. The Vols look to snap an annual losing streak that began in 2004.