The softball team swept its invitational at home and is now 19-0 and still the top team in the country. The Lady Vols will host Belmont and then start SEC play this week against LSU.

Tennessee added five more wins at the Tennessee Invitational with two against Penn State, two against Appalachian State and one against North Carolina Central. The Lady Vols will play Belmont today, Tuesday, March 3, at 5 p.m. Eastern with a livestream on SECN+. The Bruins have played two SEC teams this season in Mississippi State and Georgia and split a pair of games with both.

Tennessee wrapped up the invitational Sunday with a 6-2 win over Appalachian State with Karlyn Pickens getting her sixth win of the season and tying a career-high with 15 strikeouts. After allowing a two-run homer in the first, she held Appalachian State to one hit and struck out 11 of the final 17 batters. The Mountaineers are the first team to score more than one run in a game against Tennessee this season.

“Karlyn is the most coachable athlete I have ever had the pleasure of coaching, and that’s 30-plus years of coaching,” said coach Karen Weekly, whose post-game video can be watched HERE  (with the outdoor ambient sounds of music, clapping and an overhead helicopter). “It didn’t start off well, and you could kind of see the frustration on her face, but with Karlyn you can give her the constructive criticism that she needs in the moment, she has no ego, and she flips it and does exactly what she needs to do. I’ve never seen somebody with the talent she has that is so coachable in the moment.”

The Lady Vols took a 3-2 lead in the bottom of the third inning, and Pickens struck out the side in the top of the fourth.

“I know they  always have my back no matter what happens,” said Pickens, whose post-game video can be watched HERE. “Being able to come in the dugout and know that they’re going to get the job done makes my job a whole lot easier. I came out not really focused on attacking as much (in the first inning), and then coming back in here, rather than focus on results, I came out attacking my spot, throw the pitch I’m called, and then, usually, good things happen.”

Ella Dodge stretched the lead to 6-2 in the sixth inning with a shot over the center field wall.

“She’s another one like Karlyn that you can tell her, this is what you need to do, and she’s going to go do it,” Weekly said. “It’s having that balance of confidence and belief in yourself, but the humility to be able to take coaching. With Ella, you don’t worry about her having a bad game. She might have a bad at-bat, but right away, she’s going to make an adjustment, and that’s why she’s ready to do big things for us.”

Tennessee will host LSU for a three-game series at Sherri Parker Lee Stadium on March 6-8. Friday’s game is set for 6 p.m. with SECN+ livestream; Saturday, 3 p.m., SECN+ livestream; and Sunday, 2 p.m., SEC Network.

Penn State is a solid team that Weekly said was of SEC caliber. Appalachian State took the lead in both games against Tennessee before the Lady Vols secured the win.

“I love it,” Weekly said. “We won by a lot of runs in so many games that we hadn’t been in pressure situations. I am really happy we were in those situations this weekend, and we played really close games.”

BASKETBALL

The Lady Vols lost six conference games in a row, finished 8-8 and still ended up as the No. 6 seed in the SEC tourney after being in a four-way tie for sixth place with Georgia, Kentucky and Ole Miss. A four-tie is broken by winning percentage among the four teams against each other, and Tennessee came out on top.

Ole Miss got the No. 7 seed, Georgia, No. 8, and Kentucky, No. 9. Such is life in the SEC that the Wildcats came within one basket of beating No. 1 seed South Carolina on Sunday and claiming the No. 6 seed. Instead, Kentucky missed the shot and tumbled to No. 9, lost the single bye and now has to start the tourney on Wednesday, March 3.

Tennessee earned one bye and will start this Thursday, March 4, against the winner of Missouri vs. Alabama with tip time set for 8:03 p.m. Eastern at Bon Secours Arena in Greenville, South Carolina. The winner will play No. 1 seed Texas at the same time on Friday.

The SEC is projected to get 11 teams in the NCAA tourney because of how tough the conference is top to bottom.

“It’s harder this year than it was last year,” coach Kim Caldwell said. “I think it’s stronger than it’s ever been, and you have chunks in your schedule where it’s OK, and you have chunks in your schedule where it’s absolutely brutal, and everyone has to go through that.”

Maria M. Cornelius, a senior writer/editor at MoxCar Marketing + Communications since 2013, started her journalism career at the Knoxville News Sentinel and began writing about the Lady Vols in 1998. In 2016, she published her first book, “The Final Season: The Perseverance of Pat Summitt,” through The University of Tennessee Press and a 10th anniversary edition will be released June 16, 2026.