KNOXVILLE – The nonconference portion of a college basketball team’s schedule provides opportunities to experiment and figure things out.
Little by little, Tennessee’s women are learning – and so is their coach.
Three days removed from their first loss of the season, the ninth-ranked Lady Volunteers got back in the win column Friday by beating East Tennessee State University 80-61 at Thompson-Boling Arena. The Lady Vols (9-1) did what they do best, controlling the boards and grabbing 17 of their 33 missed shots.
Meme Jackson knocked down seven 3-pointers in the win and had a team-high 23 points. The senior was one of four Tennessee players who scored in double figures, with Zaay Green adding 12 points and Mimi Collins and Rennia Davis 11 each.
It was a far cry from Tuesday’s 95-85 loss to eighth-ranked Stanford, which made 14 3-pointers while shooting 55 percent from the field. While there is obvious disparity between the Cardinal (7-1) and ETSU (2-13), the Lady Vols held the Buccaneers to 31 percent shooting from the field, including 25 percent on their 20 attempts from 3-point range.
Lady Vols coach Holly Warlick said the team spent six hours watching video after the loss to Stanford. Tennessee’s recent recruiting classes have been highly ranked, but there is another side to that for the underclassmen-stocked roster.
“They’re learning how to understand that the films don’t lie,” Warlick said Friday evening. “They’re learning how to play with each other. You take a group that has been the star on their team – the ball’s always going to them – and now this group has to play together. It’s been hard at times, but for the majority of the time that they’ve been here, they’ve been willing to share the basketball. That speaks highly of these young ladies wanting to put the team first.
“I’ve had to get buy-in from them to play on the defensive end. They’re athletic. They can do it. It just takes a lot of effort. Kids like the offensive end – I get that. But see, defense can lead you to a great layup and easy bucket and a great pass, so I try to get buy-in from there.”
With only nine players available this season, Warlick has been challenged with finding the right types of lineups to be more successful, or when to run with certain lineups. She has size in forwards Cheridene Green (6-foot-3) and Kasiyahna Kushkituah (6-4), although Kushkituah has been battling a knee injury that has left her out of playing shape. When matchups dictate the Lady Vols need more athleticism on the court or want to create more defensive pressure, they can go with Collins (6-3).
She still has some things to fix – Collins had four fouls in 11 second-half minutes against Stanford – but as the lone forward in the freshman class, she’s going to be needed. That will be be especially true once Southeastern Conference play begins.
“I would say I am just testing everything out. I understand the rules of the hand checking, and just me having the momentum, I do get caught hand checking,” Collins said Friday. “Other than that, my thing is just to go for everything SEC, and the SEC is a very physical conference. My thing is to keep on being physical and having that standard, because the more physical we play, it is easier for us, and we can have more wins that way.”
The Lady Vols have two nonconference games remaining, against Murray State on Friday and against Belmont on Sunday, before their SEC opener at Auburn on Jan. 3, so that provides two more opportunities to improve.
Two more opportunities to experiment.
Two more opportunities to get better.
“I think Coach Warlick is just trying out different stuff,” Davis said Friday. “Just trying to see who plays well with who. We’re just trying to figure out certain combinations for defense. I think that Coach Warlick was trying to figure that out tonight. As players, regardless of what lineup is in, we need to continue to be team players.”
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @genehenley3 or at Facebook.com/VolsUpdate.