New post: how did the Stats By Will preseason predictions turn out? Some (Long Beach State winning Big West, Duquesne winning A-10, Arizona State being awful) were very good. Some (Syracuse makes NCAAT, Alabama misses) were awful. Self-reporting:
"Kill yourself for taking that 3 you f-ing worthless loser. Slit your f-ing throat you f-ing f– that was completely uncalled for. I hope you f-ing kill yourself." For late-game subs, their joy is someone else's misery and they're hearing about it.
If you are the young man who Swag Surfed™️ with your grandfather please alert me, because it was the single most heartwarming and pure thing to happen in this building tonight.
Finally got a good-quality video of Naz Reid's Flagrant 1 foul on Grant Williams in the Tennessee-LSU game. By the NCAA's definition of "involving contact with an opponent that is not only excessive, but also
severe/extreme while the ball is live"...this was a Flagrant 2.
Dan Orlovsky just drew up Tennessee's touchdown, perfectly matching the exact route run, on the screen mere seconds before it happened. Incredible telestrator work
With 12 minutes left, Kentucky led 58-48. Tennessee's season was fading fast. They needed someone to step up. Keon Johnson (12 points) and Jaden Springer (10) did, in the form of a 26-6 run that will be remembered forever at Tennessee. All 26 points in one 2-minute video:
This is the single greatest shot call in the social media era of college sports. Yes it’s hyperbole don’t care you go 40-3 with a natty in your three years and you’re basically God.
I want all Michigan fans to do this. Take 3 deep breaths... And have faith. Faith that every single Coach, player, employee in that building is doing everything they possibly can to be great.
FSU beat a 10-2 team by double digits with a third-string QB and everyone is begging to replace them with a team that had to convert 4th and 31 to beat a garbage 6-6 Auburn that got housed by New Mexico State along with beating 4-8 Arkansas by *three points* come on now
Again, Washington has two top 15 picks and will make the NCAA Tournament. Tennessee returned five players *total* from last year’s team. And yet it was Tennessee who controlled this game thoroughly from start to finish. Huge win for a team getting better each day.
If you are a Tennessee fan needing a little perspective at the moment, all four of last year’s Final Four teams lost a game on January 31 or later, and Michigan and Kansas had multiple conference losses by 15+ points. Bad games happen!
Here's something that will sell in recruiting for
@Vol_Hoops
: Tennessee and Gonzaga were the only two schools to have multiple first-round picks this year
Here's a fun one...combined former top 100 recruits in action in each Sweet Sixteen game:
Duke-Virginia Tech: 13
LSU-Michigan State: 13
Virginia-Oregon: 11
Kentucky-Houston: 11
North Carolina-Auburn: 10
Michigan-Texas Tech: 8
Gonzaga-Florida State: 4
Tennessee-Purdue: 1
Jahmai Mashack put on a legendary glue guy performance by the way. +12 +/- in 25 minutes, 2 blocks, 2 steals, 5 offensive boards, completely locked Trey Alexander down. Played his role perfectly
You may not like it. You can run from it. But Tennessee knows their brand and their brand is dragging you into the concrete mixer for 40 minutes and turning you into wet wet sludge. Black metal basketball.
“It’s hard to win college basketball games. We’ve scheduled a really competitive schedule. We’re probably playing as many young guys as anybody in our conference.”
— Coach Stackhouse after another loss to a mid-major team
(🎥:
@vucommodores
)
Tennessee basketball returns in a month and a day, and you can spend every day until then thinking about a team that has Keon Johnson, Jaden Springer, Yves Pons, Santiago Vescovi, and All-SEC John Fulkerson on it
really good that the big own here on Michigan's Astros operation is that Ohio State changed all their signals to avoid said sign-stealing, then proceeded to lose by 22
For a year, Big Ten coaches have known about the Michigan analyst pictured below who they say “spearheaded” UM’s alleged sign-stealing system.
One coach once confronted the UM analyst: “We know what kind of shit you are doing and it’s f***** up.”
Ole Miss travelled and got away with it but if you make literally one more free throw or, you know, don’t go 12 minutes without hitting a shot, it doesn’t matter. That’s easily Tennessee’s worst loss of the season.
Year 4 at Memphis. Three starters back from the NIT champions.
#1
recruiting class in the nation. Lose by 19 to Iowa State. Lose to KenPom's 174th-ranked team. Most turnovers per game in the NCAA. Penny Hardaway's not the guy.
Prepping Creighton/UT preview and I cannot believe this is real.
Creighton: 18 NCAAT bids since 1985, best run Elite Eight ('23, 6-seed) where they lost by 1 to a 5-seed.
Tennessee: 18 NCAAT bids since 1985, best run Elite Eight ('10, 6-seed) where they lost by 1 to a 5-seed.
Tennessee’s one touchdown tonight is from a tipped ball that randomly landed in Jauan Jennings’ hands. For a team with a 334-157 yardage edge, that’s kind of inexcusable.
Tennessee has a seven-man rotation, no true centers, three new starters, and the opponent has two 2020 NBA lottery picks and one of the toughest defenses in America. And Tennessee is up by 12 at halftime.
It's hard to think of a more perfect signature moment of Tennessee basketball under Rick Barnes than a gritty offensive rebound by a 6'3" Uruguayan three-point specialist
"We're such an instant gratification era ... We're trying to skip the step of adversity and growth ... but we're gonna have to face it.
Sometimes the grass isn't greener on the other side. Sometimes you're just trading one set of problems for another."
~ Eli Drinkwitz 🏈
Feel like I need to contextualize this
@Vol_Hoops
defense.
-Held Colorado to lowest offensive efficiency since Nov. 2014.
-Held Cincinnati to second-lowest efficiency of last 5 seasons.
-Currently holding App State to 0.406 PPP. Their low in the KenPom era (2002-now): 0.565 PPP.
I think we can and should hear out an argument for this UConn group as the best team in 20+ years. The only time they looked vulnerable ever was Clingan getting hurt or an opponent shooting 70% from three. It’s the best team since 38-1 Kentucky at minimum.
This is the first time since Christmas Day 1967 that Tennessee basketball has been in the top 5 of the AP Poll while Tennessee football has been in the top 10 of CFB's AP Poll. Historic
I mean...two starters down, center got hurt, you scored 13 points in the first 17 minutes, playing a Quad 1 opponent on the road. It wasn't pretty at all but if you're a Tennessee fan this is an effort you can be really, really proud of.
Being down 10-0 and giving up another home run while the opposing team passes around a pink hat reading "Daddy" is a real white-flag moment for Alabama
I do not think Tennessee could've realistically done anything better defensively tonight. Pitch-perfect gameplan, spot-on execution by the players. It's basically been this all season minus the Colorado blip. This might be the best defense in CBB.
the craziest part of the Dalton Knecht experience is not all the threes or the dunks or the layups for me but that he ISOs himself into a super-contested midrange jumper and I'm instantly like "well that's going in". Not Normal
Had Gaines not gotten fouled on the rebound - which no one saw coming - Barnes/TN would have called timeout to take him out for a different player. You can't predict that. Gaines did everything he was supposed to do.
This is great for a lot of reasons but we’re 1:41 away from Josiah-Jordan James and Santiago Vescovi being the first (super)seniors in Tennessee history to leave with a winning record at Rupp Arena (3-2). 2020, 2021, and 2024.
Very easy five-step plan to rescue this college football season from itself
1. Tennessee beats Georgia
2. Auburn beats Alabama next week
3. 10-2 Alabama beats 11-1 UGA in SECCG
4. No SEC teams make playoff
5. World peace
The most first-round upsets in the history of the tournament. Numerous double-digit comebacks. Three overtimes. 11 wins by 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15 seeds. I think we just saw the greatest Round of 64 in NCAA Tournament history.
Here's a higher-quality version not recorded on our bedroom TV for those interested (cc
@NWBearcatMBB
,
@SportsCenter
). The team is Northwest Missouri, the coach is Ben McCollum (
@CoachMcCollum
), and the Bearcats are 158-8 in their last five seasons of play
The Strip will be fully unrecognizable to anyone who attended even in the early 2010s by 2025. Thankfully we’ll be replacing various icons and varying architecture with $2700/month apts that all look the exact same.
Teams must band together and say a resounding No to the scourge of college basketball: the Spalding TF-1000. On Tennessee/Maryland, on 13 games of data showing the TF-1000's negative impact, and on a terrible game still being a net positive.
Love ESPN talking about Jauan Jennings "having problems" with the staff at Tennessee when literally everybody in existence (minus Brady Hoke, John Currie, and Jimmy Hyams) considers him an all-time beloved figure
Long season, lot of time left, every caveat in the book imaginable applies here. But: Tennessee currently has the
#1
defensive efficiency in KenPom's 22-year history at 83.7. Next-best: 2019 Texas Tech at 84.1.
You can do the Rick Barnes In March thing for retweets and likes if you want but Barnes isn't on the court, shooting 2-for-18 on mostly open threes. I don't know what to tell you. This sucks.
a bonkers effort against a likely Top 5 pick
Brandon Miller, Mashack in the game (27 mins): 0-6 FG, 4 pts via FTs
Brandon Miller, Mashack on the bench (13 mins): 4-5 FG, 11 pts
I have a large cadre of Tennessee followers for obvious reasons; I have also watched a regrettable amount of Iowa (+ Big 10) football. Here is my take: Tennessee is going to win, probably by around 8-14 points, and it is going to be a deeply frustrating 3+ hours of your life.
Tennessee’s losses, all on the road or neutral sites, have come to the
#16
,
#9
,
#17
, and
#13
teams in KenPom. I assure you that this is not a disastrous loss.