BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - Mississippi State men's basketball coach Ben Howland's time with Southeastern Conference print media was almost done Wednesday afternoon when someone asked him why he picked Tennessee to win the league this season.
"That's easy," he said at SEC media day at the Grand Bohemian Hotel. "They return everybody from the team that won the conference a year ago. And they beat Kentucky twice last year. How are they not the favorite?"
Perhaps because observers sometimes grow more enamored of the school names on the fronts of the jerseys than the players' names on the backs of the jerseys, Kentucky nosed out the Volunteers as No. 1 in the preseason media poll released Wednesday. However, that same media block voted Tennessee's Grant Williams its preseason SEC player of the year.
"That's nice," the junior forward said. "But I'd rather win it at the end of the year."
PRESEASON PICKS
A select panel of SEC and national media predicted the finish for the league’s men’s basketball teams in 2018-19, as well as its preseason standouts. Results were released Wednesday at SEC media day in Birmingham, Ala.Poll: 1. Kentucky, 2. Tennessee, 3. Auburn, 4. Mississippi State, 5. Florida, 6. LSU, 7. Alabama, 8. Vanderbilt, 9. Missouri, 10. Arkansas, 11. South Carolina, 12. Texas A&M, 13. Georgia, 14. Ole Miss.All-SEC first team: Daniel Gafford, Arkansas; Chris Silva, South Carolina; Reid Travis, Kentucky; Tremont Waters, LSU; Grant Williams, Tennessee (player of the year); second team: Bryce Brown, Auburn; Jared Harper, Auburn; Jalen Hudson, Florida; Jontay Porter, Missouri; Admiral Schofield, Tennessee; P.J. Washington, Kentucky; Quinndary Weatherspoon, Mississippi State.
Last season, the Vols shared the SEC's regular-season title with Auburn and lost 77-72 to Kentucky in the conference tournament's championship game.
Almost everyone has the Vols in position to win big trophies at the end of this season. National analyst and Hall of Famer Dick Vitale tabbed the Vols third. CBS picked them fourth. Blue Ribbon Basketball slotted them at No. 5.
That's not in the SEC. That's nationally.
As if to both validate and vacate those expectations, fourth-year Tennessee coach Rick Barnes gathered his team together a few days after their second-round NCAA tournament loss to Loyola of Chicago last March and gave them a list of teams that mirrored the Vols - experienced teams with lofty goals - and showed them how many of those have performed worse than expected the season after their breakout campaign.
"Last year we set the foundation," said Tennessee senior forward Admiral Schofield, who was voted to the preseason All-SEC second team. "But how do we grow from that?"
Said Barnes: "You start over every single day."
It certainly helps to have players such as Schofield and Williams to build around. Bright, athletic and physical enough to look like they might be more at home in Neyland Stadium than Thompson-Boling Arena, the two have become the nucleus for what could become the renaissance of Big Orange basketball.
A single moment from Wednesday's SEC media event showed the chemistry Barnes has with this team: As he was wrapping up his turn at the podium, a voice from the back of the room wanted to ask him a question. It turned out to be Schofield.
"So what's your question?" Barnes asked with a grin.
"Could you talk about your conditioning philosophy?" replied Schofield.
Without missing a beat, Barnes shot back, "My first philosophy is that I recruited two fat guys (Schofield and Williams)."
When Schofield said something back about being big instead of fat, Barnes said, "You're big now, but back then you were fat."
A few minutes later, both Schofield and Williams expanded on their coach's digs.
"When I first got (to Tennessee), my body fat was somewhere between 11 and 13," Schofield said. "By my sophomore year, it was 3.7, which was actually dangerous, but now it's around 5."
Added Williams of his body fat percentage, "I'm not sure how much it was, but it was double digits. It's a lot lower than that now. I know I couldn't run 17 (line touches in a minute) back then. I can do 18 now."
The payoff for such conditioning is far more meaningful come game night.
"It's a lot of fun," said Schofield, "when you know the other team's tired and you're just getting your second wind. That happened a lot last year, and I think it could happen even more this year. We feel like we have the number-one conditioning coach in the country."
Despite tying for the second-most SEC men's basketball championships with 10, Tennessee has never fielded a team that so much as reached the Final Four. Its NCAA tournament accomplishments include playing in one regional final, and the Vols lost that 2010 tournament game to Michigan State.
Tennessee's 2018-19 roster, though, still includes the players responsible for 90 percent of the team's points last season, which is sixth-best among Power Five conference programs. And Barnes and the Vols will have an early chance to learn of possible deficiencies thanks to a nonconference schedule that includes a Dec. 9 game against Gonzaga in Phoenix and a possible meeting with Kansas in the NIT Season Tip-Off.
It's all just talk now, from preseason rankings to playful banter to praise from rival coaches, including South Carolina's often curmudgeonly Frank Martin.
"When UT hired him, I knew it would just be a matter of time before they'd become a power in this league," Martin said. "His teams always play with discipline and energy on both ends of the floor. Plus, he's a really good dude."
Barnes said he never looks ahead more than a day. To prove it, he told reporters at media day he didn't even know where the Final Four would be played next spring.
When he was informed it would be Minneapolis, he replied, "I'd like to get there."
If Schofield, Williams and the other returning Vols can give a second wind to the run they went on last season, the Vols just might get to their first Final Four ever.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.