Tennessee basketball happiness lasted two and a half days.
The Volunteers who took down No. 1 Alabama on Wednesday didn’t show up at Kentucky until halftime on Saturday. Those who filled in scored 19 points – less than a point per minute. They fell behind by 20. It was the worst segment of the season.
Jahmai Mashack kept it from being worse. He had seven points and five rebounds. Everybody else combined for 12 points. They recovered nine missed shots.
There were a lot of misses. Tennessee hit 26 percent. It was down 39-19 at halftime. That included a miserable 1-for-13 on three-point attempts.
“We gave up 39 points in the first half and we weren’t very good. We weren’t,” Rick Barnes said. “That stemmed from our offense allowing them to get out a couple times and make some shots. They only shot, what eight threes (in the game). We knew what we had to do; we just didn’t do it in the first half.”
I almost forgot to tell you that Zakai Zeigler again had very early foul troubles and missed critical playing time.
I thought the Vols were awful. Barnes said they were just terrible.
The second half was different. No telling what the coach said during intermission. He does not use profanity. He might have mentioned walking home from Lexington and how cold it would be in Jellico.
The Vols reduced the deficit to eight. They lost by 66-54. The second half was not an embarrassment. Santiago Vescovi launched the comeback. He scored 17. He was scoreless in the first half.
Oscar Tshiebwe did not get his usual double-double for the Wildcats, just 16 points and seven rebounds. He hit 10 of 11 free throws. Oscar is a tremendous talent, 6-9, 260, national player of the year from the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Cason Wallace scored 16 and had six rebounds. Chris Livingston scored 12 and Jacob Toppin added 11.
The box score says Kentucky won the game at the free-throw line. It hit 23 of 35. Tennessee was awful (or just terrible) at foul shooting – four hits and 10 misses plus ineffectiveness on the front end of one and ones.
The way I saw it, the Vols lost the game soon after they strolled into Rupp Arena. Kentucky jumped out to a 10-2 lead. Ziggy was soon on the bench with two fouls. He never recovered. He was 2-for-10 as a shooter. Seven of his misses were threes.
“Certainly Zakai didn’t have a terrific game and he means a lot to our team, everyone knows that,” said Barnes. “His fouls hurt us. We need him to play better.
“I thought early in the game our shot selection wasn’t very good. I thought our guys let that seep into the defensive side of the court.”
Tennessee collectively hit seven of 27 in the first half. Tyreke Key was 0-for-5 for the game.
The Vols had eight turnovers.
“They came at the wrong time,” said Barnes.
“The second half we obviously opened up the court, drove the ball. Kentucky had a hard time with that. We had chances. Our turnovers really hurt. Out of a timeout, we turned it over. They missed some free throws, gave us a chance, and we didn’t rebound the ball. We threw it away coming down in transition.
“I just felt if we could’ve got within four or five points, it would’ve made it a little bit more difficult, because we were going to make them make a shot.”
Vescovi hit three threes and drove to the rim for three layups – to get the difference down to 10 with 11:40 left. It was down to eight after Mashack drove and scored at the rim with 7:25 to go.
Kentucky showed no signs of folding.
Barnes said he was disappointed in the outcome “but give Kentucky credit.”
The Wildcats were far from perfect but they played as if their life depended on the performance.
Their NCAA tournament life probably did. This sweep of the Vols may have put them in the field.
The Tennessee overview has changed a lot in a little while. February started with the ugly loss at Florida. The victory over Auburn was barely acceptable. Last-second losses to Vanderbilt and Missouri ended title talk. The triumph over the Crimson Tide was a terrific display of defense. Remember Mashack.
The Vols are now 9-5 against SEC foes. Kentucky has come from nowhere to be 9-5.
Some blame some of the slide on injuries to starters to Josiah-Jordan James and Julian Phillips. That doesn’t carry as much validity as it might have had the Vols not whipped Alabama with both sidelined.
Barnes dismissed injuries as being the deciding factor at Kentucky.
“We had enough. We brought enough guys here to win. I believe that with our team and players, but that’s with everybody doing their job, we have a group of guys that they work hard but it goes back to consistency. We know how people are going to play us. They didn’t show us anything, not one thing, that caught us off guard.”
This may have been the alarm clock for the Volunteers. They are part of fourth place in the SEC standings. They go to College Station on Tuesday against Texas A&M (7 p.m. on ESPN).
The Aggies are the surprise team in the league.
Marvin West welcomes comments or questions from readers. His address is marvinwest75@gmail.com.