Auburn guard T.J. Dunans tries to leap past Tennessee forward Admiral Schofield (5) for a shot during the second half of Tennessee's 87-77 win Tuesday night at Auburn.KNOXVILLE - Tennessee has developed a reputation as one of the toughest and hardest-playing men's basketball teams in the Southeastern Conference.
Nearly every coach in the league has complimented the Volunteers after games for their style of play this season, Auburn's Bruce Pearl becoming the latest following Tennessee's 87-77 road win Tuesday against his team.
One of Tennessee's players, however, doesn't believe the Vols have earned the label just yet.
"We know our identity, but we still don't think we're tough enough," sophomore forward Admiral Schofield said before Friday's practice ahead of today's game at Mississippi State. "We've got a long way to go, I think. We're close, but we've got a long way to go in maturity aspects.
"For an opposing coach to say something like that, it's humbling because we do work on that. We're undersized and we know we're not going to be able to outrebound everybody every night and a lot of teams are more athletic than we are, but we've got a lot of heart on this team and a lot of guys that want it. We're just going in with that attitude night in and night out."
The attitude certainly has paid off during the Vols' current four-game winning streak, which has vaulted them into the thick of the NCAA tournament bubble conversation in early February. Tennessee never trailed in its wins over Kansas State and Auburn. The Vols have played 106 minutes and 16 seconds of basketball since trailing last against Kentucky.
The perception is Tennessee is overachieving, but coach Rick Barnes and his players would contend the Vols have yet to play to their full potential.
"I don't think any of us can sit back and feel good about anything right now," Barnes said. "There's nine games left and it can swing any way that you want it to swing. We've got to do our part to make sure that we can get it to swing in our favor.
"We've got to get better," he added. "There's no question about it. They see that. I'd be disappointed if they don't, because we're pointing it out to them every way we can."
In the win at Auburn, Tennessee allowed a 22-point lead to be sliced to 10 with a poor stretch of play, and better teams than the Tigers would have punished the Vols more for their mistakes.
"Toughness is just not defined by physicality," Schofield said. "It's defined in the mental aspect as well. Mentally, we're not there where we can just continue to play for 40 minutes straight and finish games as strong as we need to. We've had an almost 30-point lead and only won by only 10 or nine. That's not a sign of a tough team.
"We've got to work on being able to finish games all the way through, not making mistakes when we're tired and when we've got big leads and letting up."
Reviewing what went wrong during the second half at Auburn was a big point of emphasis in Wednesday's video review, which preceded what Schofield called a "productive" practice Thursday.
"Everybody came in to work and had the right winning attitude," he said. "We got after each other. It was very physical once again, so we just want to translate that into the game."
Two of Tennessee's remaining games are at league leaders Kentucky and South Carolina, but the other seven opponents have a combined record of 23-40 in SEC play. Among them only Alabama has a winning league record. After today's visit to Mississippi State, the Vols will play five of their eight remaining regular-season games at home.
"When you get a lead - and it's not as easy as people think, playing with a lead - if you put that engine on idle or start closing it down, it's hard to get it started back," Barnes said. "When a team's behind, they're going to start playing (harder) and they're going to be aggressive. They're going to in a situation where they think, 'What have we got to lose?'
"They're going to come at you, and if you put it on idle, it's hard to get it started again. We've done that too many times. I don't think we've played a complete game this year. That's why I keep saying we've got to get better."
Contact Patrick Brown at pbrown@timesfreepress.com.