Tennessee’s top-10 basketball showdown Saturday night at Arizona is the definition of a tall order for the Volunteers.
The first true road game of the season will be challenging enough for the Vols, who must slow Arizona’s inside duo of 6-foot-11, 245-pound junior forward Azuolas Tubelis and 7-foot, 260-pound redshirt junior center Oumar Ballo. Tubelis averages 20.2 points and 8.6 rebounds and shoots 60.6% from the floor, while Ballo averages 18.1 and 9.4 and is making 74.7% of his attempts.
“It’s going to be hard, because they really do a great job of putting the ball inside,” Tennessee coach Rick Barnes told reporters Thursday afternoon before the team flew out to Tucson. “They are a heavy inside-out team and have shooters who surround that, and they do as good a job as anybody from the time they get the ball of looking at the basket.
“They’ve got post guys who are running to get it early, and they do a great job of throwing it up and getting to the rim.”
The pairing of the No. 6 Vols (9-1) and the No. 9 Wildcats (9-1) will be one for the night owls with its 10:30 Eastern tipoff time on ESPN2. Tennessee already has defeated No. 3 Kansas and No. 13 Maryland this season and will try to make program history with a third such conquest before Christmas.