KNOXVILLE — About 10 hours after Tennessee’s basketball team returned from a surprising 78-63 win at LSU on Wednesday night, Josh Richardson sat comfortably on a black cushioned folding chair inside the Ray Mears Room in the bowels of Thompson-Boling Arena.
The walls of the reception room, named after the former coach who helped create the Volunteers as a college basketball brand, are covered in images of past men’s and women’s players and coaches, many of them the most memorable figures in the history of Tennessee’s basketball programs.
Set to play his final home game Saturday, Richardson can begin to reflect on his four years with the Vols and ponder the legacy he’ll leave.
Perhaps the humble, easygoing Oklahoma native one day will see an image of himself on the same walls he scanned Thursday morning.
“Hopefully. That’d be pretty sweet,” Richardson told the Times Free Press. “It’s pretty loaded. Maybe they can scratch me a little corner or something.