Who knows what Nate Ament will look like in mid-March for the Tennessee Volunteers?
The early November version of Ament has been impressive, and he’s rapidly improving.
Tennessee’s five-star freshman forward scored 23 points on 6-of-12 shooting and tallied eight rebounds, five assists and two steals Saturday afternoon as the No. 18 Vols routed Northern Kentucky 95-56 before an announced crowd of 18,661 inside the Food City Center. The win was the second of the season for the Vols, who opened this past Monday night with a 76-61 downing of Mercer.
“I thought Nate was assertive driving the ball, and his passes over the top of the zone were big,” Tennessee 11th-year coach Rick Barnes said of the highest-rated signee in program history. “I thought he was really starting to see the court better. He’s three or four games out of high school. He really works at it, and we just want him to be aggressive.
“His versatility separates him from a lot of players.”
Senior point guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie complemented Ament with 20 points on 8-of-14 shooting.
The Vols committed an unsightly 19 turnovers against the Bears but reduced that total to 12 Saturday. Tennessee was plus-22 in the rounding department for a second consecutive contest.
“Our size was a huge factor in the game, and we did a much better job as a team doing some things that we practiced,” Barnes said. “I thought the mental focus was much better than it’s been.”
Ament struggled during the nationally televised exhibition against Duke on Oct. 26, with the 6-foot-10, 207-pounder going 5-of-19 from the floor and missing all five 3-point attempts. He shot better against Mercer but had one assist to three turnovers.
“I think I’m starting to go into every game with the mindset of just trying to find my teammates early and get them involved in the game,” Ament said. “I didn’t get the assists in the last game, and that’s just a point of emphasis for me.”
Kael Robinson’s 3-pointer less than three minutes in staked the Norse (1-1) to a 10-5 lead, but Tennessee reeled off the next 13 points, with J.P. Estrella capping that surge with a tip-in to make it 18-10 at the 12:05 mark of the half. The Vols took their first double-digit advantage at 23-12 on a Gillespie layup and surpassed the 20-point bulge with 3:38 before the break on another Estrella tip-in for a 46-25 lead.
Estrella scored 17 points on 8-0f-11 shooting and collected 11 rebounds.
“He still doesn’t have a clue of how good he can be,” Barnes said of the 6-11, 240-pound redshirt sophomore.
Tennessee led 52-31 at halftime after shooting 10-of-19 from 3-point range, with Ament, Gillespie, Bishop Boswell and Ethan Burg combining to go 9-of-13 from behind the arc.
The Vols will look to go 3-0 Wednesday when they host North Florida (0-1).
Odds and ends
Tennessee has won 38 consecutive nonconference games at home. … Barnes notched his 838th career victory, the most among active NCAA Division I men’s basketball coaches and ninth on the all-time list. … Junior forward Cade Phillips made his first career start.
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com.