KNOXVILLE -- The ninth-ranked Tennessee men's basketball team trailed 21st-ranked Ole Miss by 12 points with nine minutes left Saturday afternoon.
Thompson-Boling Arena was filled to the top row with fans desperately trying to lift shorthanded UT back into the game, but the Volunteers were gassed. Saturday was their second game in three days, their third in seven days, and they still had just six scholarship players.
One of those six players, senior point guard Bobby Maze, was too tired to contain Ole Miss's Chris Warren and had to sit on the bench. Maze had steadied the Vols through a turbulent two-week stretch, but he hit a wall he couldn't overcome against the physical Rebels.
Maze stayed on the bench. UT finished with more turnovers than assists and got just 11 combined points on 5-for-25 shooting from Scotty Hopson, Skylar McBee and Renaldo Woolridge.
Yet the Vols came back and won. They prevailed in overtime for a 71-69 Southeastern Conference victory.
The Vols (14-2, 2-0) left the Rebels (13-4, 1-2) wondering what went wrong after a fantastic first 30-plus minutes in one of the nation's toughest road venues.
"Obviously, this is a special win," UT coach Bruce Pearl said. "I'm always going to temper my remarks and things like that, but Ole Miss can punk you. They can hit you in the mouth, and you can go south in a hurry.
"They hit us in the mouth, but we got back up."
Said senior wing J.P. Prince: "We answer the bell. We just keep answering the bell."
Wayne Chism had a big day, and he was especially strong down the stretch despite playing 41 of the game's 45 minutes. He had 26 points and 12 rebounds on 7-for-13 shooting, 2-for-5 from 3-point range and 10-for-10 from the free-throw line.
Dunks from Hopson and Prince got the Vols within 52-46 with 7:52 left, and Chism's second 3 in 61 seconds got them within 54-52 with 5:57 left.
"We watched film. We knew he was capable," Warren said of Chism's barrage. "He made a few, the crowd got rowdy and that's what happens.
UT junior walk-on Josh Bone, a natural shooting guard who plays the point only in a pinch, hit a 3 to give the Vols their first lead with 5:23 left. The teams stayed close, and Ole Miss's DeAundre Cranson retied the score with a putback in the final minute. Both teams bungled chances to win on their final possessions in regulation.
Another Bone 3 gave the Vols a 64-61 lead with 1:41 left in bonus time, but Memphis native Terrico White's four-point play put the Rebels back in front with 1:17 left.
UT made seven of its eight free throws in the final minute, and Bone continued to pester and punish Warren -- whose scoring relegated Maze to the bench for the game's final 13 minutes.
Warren led Ole Miss with 19 points, but he turned it over three times against Bone in overtime -- and twice in a five-second stretch in the final 19 seconds.
"He just didn't have legs," Pearl said of Maze. "You could see it from the very beginning. Bobby couldn't keep Warren in front of him. I had no choice, so we stayed with Josh defensively, and he gave a tremendous defensive effort.
"Warren just couldn't turn the corner on him, and when you can keep a point guard out of the lane ... Chris Warren had one assist and five turnovers. That's Josh Bone."
Prince also praised Bone's defense, saying, "You can't coach some of the plays he made."
Bone reluctantly accepted the compliments but added, "I'm supposed to play defense."
Bone will be challenged to keep his newly expanded role in the near future, though. Guards Melvin Goins and Cameron Tatum, two of the Volunteers' three remaining indefinitely suspended players from a Jan. 1 arrest, will come back to the team today.
Junior center Brian Williams remains under indefinite suspension, according to Pearl.
"I think (Goins and Tatum) are going to be terrific, supportive," Pearl said. "They're proud of their friends and their teammates, and they'll work and they'll get ready, and they'll stay ready. Obviously, the rotations won't change right away, but it will be great to have them there."
The Vols open SEC road play Tuesday at Alabama.
Other contacts for Wes Rucker are www.twitter.com/wesrucker and www.facebook.com/tfpvolsbeat.