KNOXVILLE - A 10-day layoff and the trip home across five time zones did nothing to slow Tennessee's momentum from the Maui Invitational.
Instead the Volunteers built off the progress they showed in Hawaii last week.
Tennessee's young basketball team played by far its best game of the young season and opened December with an impressive 81-58 thrashing of visiting Georgia Tech and former Memphis coach Josh Pastner on Saturday afternoon at Thompson-Boling Arena.
"It was big for us," Vols guard Shembari Phillips said. "This game, playing an ACC team, which is a power conference, it's a confidence booster for us. Just thinking back to Maui, we took Oregon into overtime and played well against Wisconsin. We know we can play with the best of them.
"The SEC is a tough conference, so just being able to stay in those games - in my opinion I feel like we should have at least won two out of three of those games in Maui - we'll be all right. We're going to continue to build off this win. The games coming forward, you should see the same thing and we should be consistent with the effort we gave today."
It was a total team effort for the Vols (3-3), whose determination wasn't rewarded in Maui in hard-fought losses to two ranked teams.
Phillips thrived at point guard with 14 points, five rebounds and seven assists, freshman Grant Williams scored a career-best 14 points and fellow rookie John Fulkerson had 12 points and eight rebounds.
The Vols shot 53 percent, scored 20 points off turnovers and outscored the Yellow Jackets 36-16 in the paint to win in dominating fashion.
"You've got to give Tennessee credit," said Pastner, in his first season at Georgia Tech after seven seasons at Memphis. "They played with more energy than we did, and I'm disappointed about that because we pride ourselves on being an energetic team and we didn't do that today. I thought we were on our heels."
Utah State graduate transfer Lew Evans finally provided the kind of impact many hoped he would. He scored his first points as a Vol with a pair of free throws in the first half and made a layup and a 3-pointer after the break. Evans finished with seven points, six rebounds and three assists.
"We were all happy for him," Tennessee coach Rick Barnes said, "because Lew is a great example of just staying with it and grinding it. It's a long way to go, and Lew has struggled up to this point, but he was really sharp today, especially with our scouting report and the way he worked the scouting report."
Tennessee jumped to a 16-6 lead and pushed its first-half advantage to 16 points (31-15) on a 15-3 run after the Yellow Jackets pulled to within four. The Vols' 17-point halftime lead ballooned to 28 (59-31) with more than 14 minutes left in the game.
In the first half Georgia Tech made more 3-pointers than 2-point shots and shot 24 percent with 12 turnovers as the Vols ensured their post-Maui defensive emphasis paid immediate dividends.
"It's got to be who we are," Barnes said, "defensively where we're in games where maybe we aren't playing as well offensively. We're still not there, but I thought we took a bigger step today in terms of guarding their motion and doing the things they do. They run a really good offense with constant movement, and you've got to stay on edge."
Georgia Tech (4-3), picked to finish 15th in the ACC this season, shot 33 percent and finished with more turnovers (19) than field goals (18).
"Defensively we know where we need to be now," Williams said. "We're in our gaps. We know what position we need to be in on the white line. We do a great job communicating on defense now compared to how we were in the first game of the season. That's something we've been emphasizing and something we've been watching on film and discussing."
Tennessee hosts Presbyterian on Tuesday ahead of Sunday's trip to third-ranked North Carolina.