Tennessee Flashes Dominant Defense To Begin March Madness
For a moment, it felt good to see Tennessee playing basketball again. The Vols came out ready to play against Louisiana on the defensive end and got back to their brand of basketball. Tennessee held Louisiana to 19 points in the first half and was in firm control before a late run to cut into the lead. Despite that, the Vols never gave up the lead in the second half en route to a 58-55 first-round win.
As many expected, the Vols have to win games now with defense and in the half-court. The amount of points Louisiana scored speaks for itself, but Tennessee only had eight fast-break points. This contributed to the Vols nearly blowing an 18-point lead, and there's no doubt that to win Saturday, Tennessee will need to execute better on the offensive end.
Rick Barnes' game plan was to contain Louisiana's role players and let Jordan Brown get his work fairly well. Even Brown scored below his season average and only finished the game with seven rebounds. Themus Fulks did a good job distributing, finishing with 11 of Louisiana's 12 assists.
Josiah Jordan-James, Tennessee F
For the Vols, no one on their team scored more than 12 points. Key led the team, and Jahmai Mashack, who had 11, was the only other Volunteer that scored in double figures. Tennessee's three-point shooting is certainly a concern and will be important against Duke. The Vols were 4-16 from three yesterday, and Santiago Vescovi only hit one.
Regardless of the second-half performance, March is all about winning or not. Tennessee won yesterday, and that is all that matters. The Vols will have a chance on Saturday to advance to the second weekend for just the second time in Rick Barnes' tenure.
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