Preview:
There have been so many great Tennessee games played at Maples, and this year may be another. Tennessee has never quite recovered from the retirement of Pat, but they are now looking formidable again under first year coach Kellie Harper. Harper was a point guard for Pat in the 1990s and won three national championships. She then went on to a successful coaching career as head coach of North Carolina State and then Missouri State (quite successful in both places) before coming home to Tennessee. We just played against a Kelly Harper team, by the way, when we met Missouri State in the sweet 16 last year, and prevailed 55-46. But that team was scrappy and played good defense--with players a whole lot shorter and less quick than the Tennessee players.
This year, Tennessee is 8-1, 49th in the computer rankings (Massey) and 23rd in the AP. Their lone loss was to Texas who we play next, and their best win is probably over Notre Dame--which doesn't mean as much as usual. The Tennessee fan boards have little confidence in their offense but a lot in their defense--their fans think their only chance is to keep us in a low scoring slugfest and hold us in the 60s. That is probably based off of their experience in the Texas loss. They lost to Texas 66-60 but held Texas to 36% shooting and outrebounded Texas by 12. While defense and rebounding are strengths of Tennessee, they have a negative turnover and negative steals rate--despite playing against mostly inferior opponents. But they do average 7 blocks a game.
Their five starters will most probably be:
00 Rennia Davis, a 6'2" junior guard/forward who is their scoring leader at 17ppg, including a few treys at 29%.
20 Tamari Key, a 6'5" freshman center scoring 9 ppg
25 Jordan Horsten, a 6'2" freshman guard scoring 9ppg
13 Jazmine Massengil, a 6'0 sophomore guard scoring 7 points with a 4:1 assist to turnover ratio but with poor 3-pt shooting
21 Lou Brown, a 6'3" redshirt senior forward from Australia, scoring 4 ppg.
All six of their bench players get significant minutes, but none of them get a lot of points.
Tennessee lost Zaay Green, their second leading scorer, to an ACL after just two games, and their offense has not quite been the same since.
Tennessee makes 5 treys a game, but at only a 28% clip--so they wind up taking a lot of trys for 15 ppg. They prefer to drive on the basket
It sounds as if driving into the paint against them is problematic--they block a lot and have depth at center. Key has 18 blocks already. We are going to need our own shooting to heat up, and Haley's mid range jumpers may be very important in stretches.
Overview:
Tennessee came in with a vaunted defense, but our defense was more effective and theirs failed to hold us under our average. We held Tennessee to 28% shooting, blocked 9 shots, and held their star Rennia Davis to 25% shooting. Meanwhile 10 of our players scored, led by Williams with 19 (who also joined the 1000 point club tonight.)
Flow of the Game:
Tennessee started well, with their star Rennia Davis--a 29% three point shooter--getting hot and making two treys and another field goal for 8 quick point early in the first quarter. Lexie was defending her but not too successfully at first. Tennessee took a 12-10 lead. But Davis picked up two early fouls and had to sit the rest of the quarter. The game turned around immediately and we went on a 10-0 run to take a 20-12 lead, with a couple of undefendable Prechtel jumpers from the elbow being particularly notable.
Tennessee could not afford to keep Davis out, so they took the risk and played her for the whole 2nd quarter. She did not pick up another foul, but she also was scoreless in the quarter. The quarter was Tennessee's best offensively--but Lexie, Williams, and Jump answered, and we finished the half up 34-24.
The game was essentially put away in the third. Williams clearly ended her drought and began to hit treys, layups, but she also assisted a trey by Prechtel and a trey by Jump. Prectel and Hull made additional treys late in the quarter, and our hockey-line changes were visibly exhausting the Tennessee players. They never gave up, but when Prechtel's trey extended out lead to 19 late in the quarter, you could see the body language change.
Tennessee continue to fight in the fourth quarter, but Prechtel assisted a trey by Fingall that extended the lead to 20, Jones cut through traffic for two layups, and even Brown and Wilson got in some feel-good (and very pretty) scores as the quarter wore on. The Anna Wilson straight-down-the-middle-of-the-floor layup with no one stopping her was the period at the end of the sentence.
Performances:
We shot 43% to their 28% and that tells most of the story.
We made 11 treys to their five.
We slightly out rebounded them--and rebounding has been their biggest strength. However, we gave them 19 O-boards resulting in 18 second chance points. Our inability to box out was probably our weakest link tonight.
We had 13 turnovers to their 11. Both teams have been turnover prone, we cut down on ours but so did they.
14 of our 29 baskets were assisted, 7 of their 20. This more than anything shows how we were able to make them one-dimensional.
Williams certainly gets the game ball. She led with 19 points and 7 assists. And she was at a massive height disadvantage the whole game.
Lexie and Prechtel each nearly had double doubles. Lexie with 11 points and 9 rebounds, Prechtel with 10 points and 8 rebounds.
I thought Prechtel had a simply outstanding game--many of those rebounds were contested and she fought hard for them. She also had 3 assists and 3 blocks, and at 2/5 three pointers and her shots from the elbow she was critical to our offense.
Many other players made contributions--this was even more of a "team effort" than usual. Jones had a quieter stat line than normal, with 8 points, but she also spend a lot of time defending Rennia Davis and her contributions on defense should not be underestimated. Belibi fouled out with 7 points, but more importantly she literally pushed around bigger Tennessee players in the paint and helped to exhaust them. Fingall was 2/4 fromt three point range, grabbed 6 rebounds, and was part of the "wear them down" defense.
Conclusion:
Very little to complain about here. It was about time for Williams to have an outstanding game, and she did. And it was about time for Prechtel to shine, and she did.
This team just gets better, it is playing better and seems more mature by the game. But now it is of to the first genuine road trip to hostile territory. Sunday's game at Texas will be a different kind of test--and a necessary one. In the meantime, congratulations on our best all-around performance of the year--so far. It feels like we have learned a lot since Gonzaga.
There have been so many great Tennessee games played at Maples, and this year may be another. Tennessee has never quite recovered from the retirement of Pat, but they are now looking formidable again under first year coach Kellie Harper. Harper was a point guard for Pat in the 1990s and won three national championships. She then went on to a successful coaching career as head coach of North Carolina State and then Missouri State (quite successful in both places) before coming home to Tennessee. We just played against a Kelly Harper team, by the way, when we met Missouri State in the sweet 16 last year, and prevailed 55-46. But that team was scrappy and played good defense--with players a whole lot shorter and less quick than the Tennessee players.
This year, Tennessee is 8-1, 49th in the computer rankings (Massey) and 23rd in the AP. Their lone loss was to Texas who we play next, and their best win is probably over Notre Dame--which doesn't mean as much as usual. The Tennessee fan boards have little confidence in their offense but a lot in their defense--their fans think their only chance is to keep us in a low scoring slugfest and hold us in the 60s. That is probably based off of their experience in the Texas loss. They lost to Texas 66-60 but held Texas to 36% shooting and outrebounded Texas by 12. While defense and rebounding are strengths of Tennessee, they have a negative turnover and negative steals rate--despite playing against mostly inferior opponents. But they do average 7 blocks a game.
Their five starters will most probably be:
00 Rennia Davis, a 6'2" junior guard/forward who is their scoring leader at 17ppg, including a few treys at 29%.
20 Tamari Key, a 6'5" freshman center scoring 9 ppg
25 Jordan Horsten, a 6'2" freshman guard scoring 9ppg
13 Jazmine Massengil, a 6'0 sophomore guard scoring 7 points with a 4:1 assist to turnover ratio but with poor 3-pt shooting
21 Lou Brown, a 6'3" redshirt senior forward from Australia, scoring 4 ppg.
All six of their bench players get significant minutes, but none of them get a lot of points.
Tennessee lost Zaay Green, their second leading scorer, to an ACL after just two games, and their offense has not quite been the same since.
Tennessee makes 5 treys a game, but at only a 28% clip--so they wind up taking a lot of trys for 15 ppg. They prefer to drive on the basket
It sounds as if driving into the paint against them is problematic--they block a lot and have depth at center. Key has 18 blocks already. We are going to need our own shooting to heat up, and Haley's mid range jumpers may be very important in stretches.
Overview:
Tennessee came in with a vaunted defense, but our defense was more effective and theirs failed to hold us under our average. We held Tennessee to 28% shooting, blocked 9 shots, and held their star Rennia Davis to 25% shooting. Meanwhile 10 of our players scored, led by Williams with 19 (who also joined the 1000 point club tonight.)
Flow of the Game:
Tennessee started well, with their star Rennia Davis--a 29% three point shooter--getting hot and making two treys and another field goal for 8 quick point early in the first quarter. Lexie was defending her but not too successfully at first. Tennessee took a 12-10 lead. But Davis picked up two early fouls and had to sit the rest of the quarter. The game turned around immediately and we went on a 10-0 run to take a 20-12 lead, with a couple of undefendable Prechtel jumpers from the elbow being particularly notable.
Tennessee could not afford to keep Davis out, so they took the risk and played her for the whole 2nd quarter. She did not pick up another foul, but she also was scoreless in the quarter. The quarter was Tennessee's best offensively--but Lexie, Williams, and Jump answered, and we finished the half up 34-24.
The game was essentially put away in the third. Williams clearly ended her drought and began to hit treys, layups, but she also assisted a trey by Prechtel and a trey by Jump. Prectel and Hull made additional treys late in the quarter, and our hockey-line changes were visibly exhausting the Tennessee players. They never gave up, but when Prechtel's trey extended out lead to 19 late in the quarter, you could see the body language change.
Tennessee continue to fight in the fourth quarter, but Prechtel assisted a trey by Fingall that extended the lead to 20, Jones cut through traffic for two layups, and even Brown and Wilson got in some feel-good (and very pretty) scores as the quarter wore on. The Anna Wilson straight-down-the-middle-of-the-floor layup with no one stopping her was the period at the end of the sentence.
Performances:
We shot 43% to their 28% and that tells most of the story.
We made 11 treys to their five.
We slightly out rebounded them--and rebounding has been their biggest strength. However, we gave them 19 O-boards resulting in 18 second chance points. Our inability to box out was probably our weakest link tonight.
We had 13 turnovers to their 11. Both teams have been turnover prone, we cut down on ours but so did they.
14 of our 29 baskets were assisted, 7 of their 20. This more than anything shows how we were able to make them one-dimensional.
Williams certainly gets the game ball. She led with 19 points and 7 assists. And she was at a massive height disadvantage the whole game.
Lexie and Prechtel each nearly had double doubles. Lexie with 11 points and 9 rebounds, Prechtel with 10 points and 8 rebounds.
I thought Prechtel had a simply outstanding game--many of those rebounds were contested and she fought hard for them. She also had 3 assists and 3 blocks, and at 2/5 three pointers and her shots from the elbow she was critical to our offense.
Many other players made contributions--this was even more of a "team effort" than usual. Jones had a quieter stat line than normal, with 8 points, but she also spend a lot of time defending Rennia Davis and her contributions on defense should not be underestimated. Belibi fouled out with 7 points, but more importantly she literally pushed around bigger Tennessee players in the paint and helped to exhaust them. Fingall was 2/4 fromt three point range, grabbed 6 rebounds, and was part of the "wear them down" defense.
Conclusion:
Very little to complain about here. It was about time for Williams to have an outstanding game, and she did. And it was about time for Prechtel to shine, and she did.
This team just gets better, it is playing better and seems more mature by the game. But now it is of to the first genuine road trip to hostile territory. Sunday's game at Texas will be a different kind of test--and a necessary one. In the meantime, congratulations on our best all-around performance of the year--so far. It feels like we have learned a lot since Gonzaga.
