Bryce Harvey
Tennessee basketball has had one of the best seasons in program history, there’s no arguing that. However, after the last few weeks, fans are starting to question how good this team truly is. About a month ago, this Tennessee team was firing on all cylinders and making other teams look like high school jv squads. Since then, the Vols have put on several lackluster performances including a double-digit loss at Kentucky and a loss in overtime at LSU. Is the sky falling in Knoxville or are people overreacting?
Before Tennessee’s latest loses, they were 23-1 and had sole possession of the SEC. The Vols were playing ok basketball, then they walked into Rupp Arena. Tennessee played their worst game of the season in a 86-69 blowout win for Kentucky. This loss seemed to be coming for weeks as the Vols had squeaked by several lower level SEC teams. However, nobody could’ve predicted how bad the Wildcats out physicaled, out hustled, and overall just outplayed the Volunteers. They led the Vols in every statistical category except free throw percentage. One would think after a miserable showing and the team getting embarrassed on national television that they would wake up right? Well, that just wasn’t the case. The next Tuesday the Vols squeaked by a then 9-17 Vanderbilt team by only 12 points at TBA. On paper, this game looks ok, but the Vols needed a last minute run and several free throws to put the Commodores away. Now surely Tennessee would wake up after a blowout and a narrow escape from a team that is currently 0-14 in SEC conference play right? Wrong.
Playing in Baton Rouge is always challenging. Whether LSU is good or bad, they always seem to play their best games at home. Last Saturday’s game was definitely an example of that. LSU was without Tremont Waters, who is arguably the best scoring point guard in the SEC. On top of that, LSU’s big man, Naz Reid got into foul trouble very early and only managed to score one point throughout the whole game. Despite that, the Tigers were able to overcome both of those factors on their way to a 82-80 overtime win against the Volunteers. Freshman guard Ja’vonte Smart and Junior guard Skylar Mays both went for career highs as the Tigers handed Tennessee their second loss of the week. Many fans wanted to point to the poor officiating as Tennessee’s downfall. Some even went as far as looking up the head official and finding a picture of him on Facebook with an LSU shirt back in 2014. Since then, the SEC has been in contact with the official. He released a statement saying that he came across the shirt at a store, while he was traveling in Spain. The official thought it was cool that the SEC had made it across to Spain so he snapped a picture and put it on Facebook. Obviously nobody truly knows how true that statement is, but I don’t think an SEC official with Anthony Jordan’s pedigree would post a picture acting as a fan of an SEC team on social media. With all that aside, the game was definitely not referred the best for either team. However, Tennessee can not blame this loss on the refs. The Vols led the Tigers in every statistical category except for free throw percentage. Looking at this game on paper one would think the Vols outplayed LSU and won by about 10 points. That just wasn’t the case. Tennessee committed 14 turnovers compared to LSU’s 7. During the first half of the season, Tennessee had one of the best assist to turnover ratios in all of college basketball. Since the Kentucky game however, Tennessee’s assists have been down and the turnovers have been up. This team seems to have become more selfish over the last month. This needs to be fixed before tournament time or else Tennessee can kiss their Final Four hopes goodbye.
Some good news finally came Wednesday night for the Vols as they were able to claw their way out of Oxford with a 73-71 win over Ole Miss. This was really good to see as the Vols needed to win a close game just simply for a morale boost going into the rematch with Kentucky on Saturday. While the Vols shot a season low of 23.1% from beyond the arc, they were able to beat the Rebels inside for a whopping 36 points in the paint. On top of that Tennessee was able to get Grant Williams and Lamonte Turner going as Grant went for 21 points and Turner went for 17 points on the night. So with these last four games in the books the question begs to be asked; is the sky truly falling in Knoxville?
As the great Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers once said, “R-E-L-A-X”. The sky is definitely not falling in Knoxville just yet. Have the Volunteers been playing their best basketball over the past few weeks? Absolutely not. However, a couple of weeks in the regular season do not make or break a basketball team. In my opinion Tennessee needed to lose a couple of games before tournament time. The team looked to have lost the fire and tenacity they began the season with until this Ole Miss game. The Ole Miss game wasn’t perfect by any stretch, but the team was able to claw its way out of a very hostile environment for a win over a top 4 SEC program. Now I’m not saying that all of Tennessee’s issues are fixed simply because they won a game. But I do believe they are back on the right track as they prepare for the final week of the regular season and a key rematch against Kentucky. This Tennessee team is special and the fans need to enjoy every second of this Final Four run come March.
Comments