Shooting Woes Doom No. 15 Indiana in 66-58 Loss to Tennessee

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Indiana had it chances on Thursday evening in Assembly Hall.

In fact, the No. 15-ranked Hoosiers had multiple chances — six to be exact — to take the lead in the fourth quarter over Tennessee.

After cutting Tennessee's lead to one, Indiana missed six-straight shots to go in front for the first time since the first quarter.

The defense held up, the rebounding was there, but the shots just didn't fall.

Tennessee finally hit a shot to go back up three points, and the Volunteers never looked back from there, taking the victory 66-58.

"We just didn't hit shots," head coach Teri Moren said. "We had a difficult time tonight finding the basket."

From the start, the size and length of Tennessee presented a major problem for Indiana.

The Hoosiers were outrebounded 16-9 in the first quarter, and as a result, fell behind 17-9 on the scoreboard after the first 10 minutes.

"Yeah, they started off big in the game," senior guard Jaelynn Penn said. "We knew they were gonna try to take advantage of their size. It was something they capitalized on us."

Tennessee was able to extend its lead to 10 at halftime, and Indiana's shooting continued to be cold.

The Hoosiers shot just 1-of-15 from behind the 3-point line in the first half.

At the start of the second half, Tennessee came out hot, making three 3-pointers in a row, and extending its lead to 16 with 7:50 to go in the third quarter.

But that's when Indiana started to fight back. By the end of the third quarter, Indiana had cut it down to six due in large part to the defensive effort of Penn.

Penn had five steals on the night, and she kept jumping the passing lines and getting out in transition for some easy buckets.

She continued that aggression in the fourth quarter, and that's when Indiana cut the deficit to just one.

"Defense definitely got us back in the game," Penn said. "Getting steals, making them go one-and-done, and just running. We're a running team, we like to push the pace."

Penn finished the game with 14 points and 10 rebounds, but she was 0-of-7 from three, which is something she said she can't afford to do.

As a team, Indiana shot just 2-of-27 from beyond the arc.

"One, that is probably too many threes that we should be taking especially on a night when they are not going down," Moren said. "So, that is frustrating. Layups were sort of the same story to the rim. We had a couple of kids that where it just wasn’t their night. I don’t want to make excuses. We looked like a team who has had eleven days off and we had no rhythm, no real pace to the game."

This is now Indiana's second straight loss of the season, falling to 2-2 in its nonconference slate.

The Hoosiers will now enter Big Ten play, starting with Nebraska on Sunday in Assembly Hall at 4 p.m. ET.

Moren hopes the Big Ten schedule goes a little more smoothly for Indiana in terms of the rhythm of the games and not having to deal with many cancellations.

She also isn't worried about her team. Despite suffering two losses to two SEC opponents the Hoosiers know they can beat, Moren knows she has a good basketball team in Bloomington. Her players know that as well.

"We're gonna come back tomorrow, critique the film and see what we can do to improve," Penn said. "These are two losses that we feel like we can win, and we know that we're better, so just keep getting better every day."

Below is the full box score from the game Thursday:

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