After racking up more than 1,000 all-purpose yards and eight total touchdowns last season at Duke, running back Star Thomas is taking his talents to play SEC football at Tennessee next season.

Thomas announced that he would be transferring to Rocky Top nearly one month ago on Jan. 19, 2025.

The six-foot, 210-pound running back spent his first two seasons at New Mexico State where he tallied 1,178 rushing yards, 351 receiving yards, nine rushing touchdowns, and five receiving touchdowns with the Aggies.

Thomas then hit the transfer portal for his junior season and wound up in the ACC with Duke. In his lone season in Durham, Thomas picked up 871 yards and seven touchdowns on the ground as well as 153 yards and one touchdown through the air.

Thomas’s versatility in the backfield as a runner and a pass-catcher should give him a dynamic opportunity with Josh Heupel’s offense in 2025. Sports Illustrated’s Matt Giles also referred to Thomas as a “durable 12-game force in the backfield” for the Blue Devils last season in an article from December.

After losing historic running back Dylan Sampson to the NFL Draft this offseason, Tennessee’s running back room is going to have a lot of eyes on it during spring camp this fall. The Vols return rising redshirt sophomore DeSean Bishop and rising sophomore Peyton Lewis in 2025, two players who saw solid rotational action during the 2024 season. Bishop started the season as Sampson’s rotational backup until an injury saw him sidelined for a handful of games, leading to the freshman Lewis earning snaps at the second-string slot.

While Tennessee has brought in a handful of productive players in the portal this offseason, ESPN’s Max Olson has Thomas tagged as the Vols’ top addition.

“Dylan Sampson was a breakout star and the SEC’s leading rusher in 2024, turning 278 touches on offense into 1,634 yards and 22 touchdowns,” Olson wrote for ESPN. “That’s a ton of production to replace. Thomas has rushed for 2,049 yards and 16 scores over three seasons at Duke and New Mexico State and was granted an extra season of eligibility as a former juco transfer. He’ll team up with DeSean Bishop and Peyton Lewis to power a run game that should benefit from the arrival of new starting offensive guards Wendell Moe Jr. (Arizona) and Sam Pendleton (Notre Dame).”

More from RTI: Tennessee Football Promotes Key Analyst As New Outside Linebackers Coach

Moe and Pendleton, the two arriving guards that Olson mentioned, also came to Tennessee through the portal this offseason.

Pendleton heads to Rocky Top as a four-star transfer prospect while Thomas, Moe, and wide receiver Amari Jefferson come in as three-star portal players. 247Sports has Tennessee’s transfer class ranked No. 90 in the nation with its four additions.

Tennessee also returns running backs coach De’Rail Sims after his debut season with the program in 2024, helping Dylan Sampson rack up the most single-season rushing yards in program history. With Sims entering his second year on Rocky Top, Bishop and Lewis continuing their development from the previous season, and the addition of versatile threat Star Thomas from the transfer portal, Tennessee’s running backs room is certainly going to be one of the big storylines of spring camp in just a few weeks to see just how much that development is progressing.

ESPN’s Max Olsen picked out his key transfer addition for each Way-Too-Early Top 25 team, though no outgoing Tennessee players ended up on the list for other teams.

To see Olson’s complete list, check out ESPN’s article from Tuesday here.