KNOXVILLE – After Sunday’s win at Vanderbilt, Tennessee women’s basketball coach Holly Warlick gave her players something they needed as much as their third consecutive win.
“I gave them two days off,” Warlick said Sunday afternoon on the Vol Network.
The Lady Volunteers improved to 15-7 and 4-5 in the Southeastern Conference with the 82-65 win in Nashville. It was a performance reminiscent of the team’s early-season success: Four players scored double-figure points, led by Evina Westbrook’s 18 to go along with five assists. Rennia Davis had her sixth double-double of the season and her second consecutive, with 17 points and 12 rebounds. While Meme Jackson continued her shooting struggles, she made all six of her free throws and matched Davis with 17 points. Freshman guard Zaay Green had 11 rebounds, affecting the game despite going 3-for-10 from the floor.
Starting forwards Kasiyahna Kushkituah and Cheridene Green had a combined 12 points and 13 rebounds, while freshman Mimi Collins came off the bench to add 10 points and five rebounds in 12 minutes.
It’s the type of overall performance the Lady Vols need in their next game Sunday at sixth-ranked Mississippi State.
“We need that consistency from the inside, especially with the games we have coming up,” Davis said Sunday on the Vol Network. “The SEC is a guard-oriented league in general, but when we get an extra boost from our presence inside, it gives us another level we can go to.”
Tennessee dominated the backboards (56-31), turned 25 offensive rebounds into 20 second-chance points, had 18 points off 12 Vanderbilt turnovers and scored 42 points in the paint. When the Commodores got close – cutting the Tennessee lead to 57-56 with 6:41 to play – the Lady Vols responded with a 10-0 run, ending the game by outscoring Vanderbilt 25-9 and holding the Commodores to two field goals in the final six-plus minutes.
“We just come together regardless of the situation,” Davis said. “The coaches may be worked up, the fans may be screaming, but we understand what we have to do at that time.”
Obviously, things haven’t always looked great over the past few weeks. The Lady Vols lost six straight games for the first time in nearly 50 years. While two of those losses (at Alabama and at home against Notre Dame) were double-digit defeats, the other four were by a combined nine points.
The losing streak led to calls for Warlick’s job, calls that the players and staff dealt with and largely shrugged off. But now that the losing streak is behind them, the Lady Vols have a few days to rest, which should help them physically and mentally.
“We need this break,” Warlick said. “We’re a little sore and banged up a bit, but we’ll prepare (for Mississippi State). Anybody that watches the SEC, it’s a grind. This will be a welcomed off day; when I told them about it, I got a bigger cheer than I did for the win.”
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @genehenley3 or at Facebook.com/VolsUpdate.