The Official #6 [2] Tennessee vs. #2 [1] Houston Game Thread, 2:20 PM ET, CBS

#2,527
#2,527
KeyVol14 said:
Not sure if we will ever make it to the final four. These last two teams were our best chance
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The situation reminds me of some of those older Vol football fans I had for relatives, when they'd get that faraway look in their eyes talking about how they may never see Tennessee win another football championship in their lives. I'm sure many of us have experienced the same. Maybe even feel the same way ourselves.

The idea of cutting down the nets just feels distant, like a place you want to go to, but you don't have a map and can't imagine how far away it is.
 
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#2,529
#2,529
We hit 35%+ from 3 and we win.

All the other numbers are fun to look at and debate, but it almost always comes down to which team hits the highest % of threes.
 
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#2,530
#2,530
djwes said:
I'd been a Tenn fan since I was little and I'm an alum.

White has been a fantastic hire as an AD, the best I can recall in my lifetime.

I think CKC did an amazing job with the Lady Vols in year one. I she has the youth, passion and potential to get the Lady Vols back to Elite status.

CRB turned Tenn MBB into a consistent winning team and made the job much more attractive than when he was hired.

The men were never an elite BB team, just a solid middle/upper-middle SEC squad that can make occasional runs, topping out, as today in the 16 or 8.

Honestly, I'm not even upset about the loss, the first half was awful, but not unexpected.

Some coaches have the ability to inspire a killer mindset and I believe that is key in progressing from good to great to elite.

Saban, Smart, Summit, Auriemma, Staley, etc. like them or not that have/had that.

Vitello has it.

Heupel might have it, still can't call that one.

Caldwell seems to have to have it.

Rick seems like you would be playing for a loving, very knowledgeable and supportive grandpa. But he's 70, and 70 year-olds don't tend to have killer competitive drive.

The product is what it is until Rick decides to retire, he's likely earned that.
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I said this when we hired Barnes that if we could get 4-6 solid years out of him, his time here would be ranked a big success. The fact we have gotten him for a decade while continuing to trend upward is a miracle.

Rick has earned the right to tell Tennessee when his time is over here.
 
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#2,531
#2,531
Majors said:
Alot of hand checks by Houston that were called all year. Over the back not called that ended up with an extra possession resulting in 2.
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Okay. If you wanna whine about refs in a game where we broke offensive futility records and the opponent shot only 4 free throws, have at it. But it’s impossible to take you seriously. I guess if they had called that over the back, we would only have lost by 17.
 
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#2,532
#2,532
djwes said:
I'd been a Tenn fan since I was little and I'm an alum.

White has been a fantastic hire as an AD, the best I can recall in my lifetime.

I think CKC did an amazing job with the Lady Vols in year one. I she has the youth, passion and potential to get the Lady Vols back to Elite status.

CRB turned Tenn MBB into a consistent winning team and made the job much more attractive than when he was hired.

The men were never an elite BB team, just a solid middle/upper-middle SEC squad that can make occasional runs, topping out, as today in the 16 or 8.

Honestly, I'm not even upset about the loss, the first half was awful, but not unexpected.

Some coaches have the ability to inspire a killer mindset and I believe that is key in progressing from good to great to elite.

Saban, Smart, Summit, Auriemma, Staley, etc. like them or not that have/had that.

Vitello has it.

Heupel might have it, still can't call that one.

Caldwell seems to have to have it.

Rick seems like you would be playing for a loving, very knowledgeable and supportive grandpa. But he's 70, and 70 year-olds don't tend to have killer competitive drive.

The product is what it is until Rick decides to retire, he's likely earned that.
Click to expand...
Well, Geno Auriemma is over 70 so...
 
#2,537
#2,537
JMSqb11 said:
I said this when we hired Barnes that if we could get 4-6 solid years out of him, his time here would be ranked a big success. The fact we have gotten him for a decade while continuing to trend upward is a miracle.

Rick has earned the right to tell Tennessee when his time is over here.
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100% and he said in the post-game, after honoring the seniors, that WE (Team) owe it to them to continue. I think he still has something to go for.
 
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#2,540
#2,540
GBO18 said:
Keep giving me Sweet 16s and Elite 8s, I will take my chances on us finding it one year and getting over the hump.
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Yeah, maybe. I can’t really complain, we’ve never been this consistently very good In the past 30 years, or ever really. Pearl had us going in the right direction. Who knows what would have happened if he had continued as coach. Sadly that didn’t happen. I suppose we’re within our expected or above our historical level.
when Barnes was hired I figured he was just padding his checkbook. I was wrong, he has exceeded my hopes. Next hire will be critical.
 
#2,541
#2,541
djwes said:
I'd been a Tenn fan since I was little and I'm an alum.

White has been a fantastic hire as an AD, the best I can recall in my lifetime.

I think CKC did an amazing job with the Lady Vols in year one. I she has the youth, passion and potential to get the Lady Vols back to Elite status.

CRB turned Tenn MBB into a consistent winning team and made the job much more attractive than when he was hired.

The men were never an elite BB team, just a solid middle/upper-middle SEC squad that can make occasional runs, topping out, as today in the 16 or 8.

Honestly, I'm not even upset about the loss, the first half was awful, but not unexpected.

Some coaches have the ability to inspire a killer mindset and I believe that is key in progressing from good to great to elite.

Saban, Smart, Summit, Auriemma, Staley, etc. like them or not that have/had that.

Vitello has it.

Heupel might have it, still can't call that one.

Caldwell seems to have to have it.

Rick seems like you would be playing for a loving, very knowledgeable and supportive grandpa. But he's 70, and 70 year-olds don't tend to have killer competitive drive.

The product is what it is until Rick decides to retire, he's likely earned that.
Click to expand...
I agree with most of your post, but I don't think losing today had anything to do with Barnes ability to not get the most out of his team. As you mentioned, and most others probably agree with, this team was mostly seen as a Sweet 16 team. Getting to the elite 8 was nice.

But the reason they were viewed as a Sweet 16 team was becuase of the roster. Not some lack of competitive drive. I think it mostly had to do with our inside personnel. We lost JP early on. Okpara was inconsistent and didn't bring much offense outside of dunks and lobs around the rim. Cade has good effort and decent rebounder, but still has growing to do offensively. We really needed to RS one of this first two years. Igor was supppsed to change the dynamic of the team, but was too inconsistent as a scorer.

Becuase of all these reasons, most recognized the ceiling of our team was limited. Once our guards were well defended, we didn't have much else to go to inside. There is no one on our team we have that could post up and generate offense in the paint when nothing else is working.
 
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#2,544
#2,544
I really enjoyed this year. Turned out a lot better than I imagined going into the year. Really happy our last win convincingly knocked UK out of it. That's very rewarding. Would have loved to win today but at least we didn't get robbed. That would have been miserable. And it just seemed all tournament four 1 seeds as the Final Four was in the cards.
 
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#2,548
#2,548
VolunteerCeltic said:
Tennessee program is good but not great, love Barnes but this is the ceiling
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Anybody that thinks they can define a ceiling on sports athlete driven with chemistry variables is nuts. If we have better players next year we likely have better results. Might not have a short bench next year due to injury and unexpected defection, a couple of guys did not sustain levels we needed to be a better team.

But I can’t imagine anybody has a better pitch for difference makers to follow DK and Lanier than Barnes. So I will keep my Vol card in tact and dismiss those FOLLOWERS with negative value add to the program. They can only have positive value add to the LEGION membership.
 
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#2,549
#2,549
We went ice cold shooting, and then just kept chucking up threes even though they just were not falling. Whether that was due to nerves, opponent defense, or just having a cold night, we could discuss all night.

Today, Houston jumped on us quick and then followed UK’s blueprint on beating us. The larger the lead they took, the tighter we played. IMO, players just were too wound up and couldn’t relax a bit to let the shots flow.

It sucks, but that is the tournament. You just can’t have a down game or anyone can get beat.

But we did play one of the best teams I have seen all year today. Idk if they beat Duke—again, any team at this point can beat anyone else—but if they play Duke like they played us, they are in the finals. That being said, Duke tools almost like men playing against boys this year.
 
#2,550
#2,550
I want to personally thanks our players and coaches for the amazing season. 30 win season and in the top 10 for the whole year. Thanks for all their dedication and commitment to winning. They have invested many hours of hard work. Best of luck to all our players and especially to the ones who finished their college careers. I have no doubt they will make outstanding citizens in their communities and more importantly be good husbands and fathers. They’ve had a model coach to learn from on how to do things in life the right way. We didn’t reach our goal today which we are all disappointed but the real winners are our players as they have learned valuable life lessons to pass down to their children and grandchildren. We didn’t win the game today, but our players won valuable life lessons because of our head coach. Go Vols!
 
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