On paper, Tennessee appears to have one of the deepest groups of receivers in the SEC this season, maybe the country. But Vols fans only need to look back to 2014 to how quickly depth can become a position of need.

Four Vols wide receivers — Marquez North, Josh Smith, Cody Blanc and Jason Croom — all suffered season-ending injuries. In addition, Von Pearson missed a few games.

As of now, it appears that North, Pearson and Pig Howard will be the starters when UT goes with a three-receiver set. But how does it look behind them should one or more go down?

Last year the 6-foot-1, 217-pound Smith played in three games, catching 10 passes for 135 yards and a touchdown. He underwent surgery on Nov. 6 and redshirted. Smith suffered the injury in the second half against Oklahoma, a game in which he caught a 40-yard touchdown pass. The Knoxville native tried to fight through it, but that’s nearly impossible with a severe high-ankle sprains.

Smith was getting raves during fall camp. But you have to wonder how long the guy can stay healthy. Groin and hamstring injuries prevented him from running during the summer. He played through a torn knee meniscus and a busted finger as a true freshman.

Croom suffered a torn ACL during a December practice for the TaxSlayer Bowl against Iowa, which he obviously missed. In 12 games last year, Croom caught 21 passes for 305 yards and four touchdowns, three of which came in November games against South Carolina, Kentucky and Missouri.

The redshirt junior should make a fantastic red-zone option at 6-foot-5, 246 pounds. Croom has had to miss some practices because of that knee and it often takes a full year to fully recover. He’s not 100 percent yet.

Josh Malone (6-foot-3, 200 pounds) was good in spurts last year as a touted recruit, but wasn’t a star. He finished the season with 23 receptions for 231 yards and a touchdown but caught only four passes for 22 yards in the season’s final six games. Not what was expected from a guy considered one of the top 10 receiver recruits in the nation and No. 2 overall player out of the state of Tennessee behind Jalen Hurd.

Malone didn’t miss any games but was nagged by a groin injury the second half of the season.

“I’m playing a lot faster, and I just feel a lot more comfortable out there,” Malone said to the Chattanooga Times Free Press recently. “I’m able to do the stuff that I want to do out there on the field.”

The transition for Jauan Jennings from quarterback to receiver has been one of the stories of camp. The 6-foot-3, 201-pounder was a four-star quarterback signee out of Murfreesboro, Tenn.

“He’s definitely hungry to get better every day,” quarterback Josh Dobbs said to the Chattanooga paper.

“It’s been a great transition for him. I think it really helped him coming in the spring and being a quarterback, because he was able to understand the concepts and the quarterback’s reads.”

Butch Jones added this of the position switch: “It has exceeded our expectations right away.”

Perhaps easily forgotten is senior Johnathon Johnson (5-foot-8, 184), who played in 11 games last year, making one start, with 10 catches for 117 yards with two touchdowns — both scores came against Chattanooga.

Five-star freshman Preston Williams remains in eligibility limbo after his standardized-test score was flagged by the NCAA. It’s probably too late to expect him to contribute in 2015.

I say Malone has the biggest impact of all these backups. You can’t teach his size and speed, and he showed his potential with a five-catch, 75-yard game against an excellent Ole Miss defense last year. But at least there are options should one of the starters go down.