The Knoxville News Sentinel reporter talks about how Tennessee changed this year, the players to watch, and more.
Over the past three seasons, Ohio State women’s basketball faced the Tennessee Volunteers twice. Each time ended with a win for the Buckeyes in the home-and-home series. For Buckeye fans who have not watched Tennessee or paid attention to the Vols in the SEC this season, it is a far different team out of Rocky Top for Sunday’s matchup in the NCAA Tournament.
To learn more about the team’s new identity, sports journalist Cora Hall from the Knoxville News Sentinel spent time talking with Land-Grant Holy Land. The award-winning sports writer talked about the players in Tennessee to watch, a late lull for head coach Kim Caldwell’s side, and more about the transformation of the Volunteers.
Land-Grant Holy Land: For Ohio State fans who watched the last two games against Tennessee over the last three years, Tennessee is very different this year with Kim Caldwell joining the team in the offseason. How are the Volunteers different from the last time an Ohio State fan might have watched them play?
Knoxville News Sentinel: They’re pretty much completely different, I would say. Just because it starts with her system. It’s kind of like the fast pace, they shoot a lot of threes, they have a ton of players who can contribute on both ends of the floor and obviously the pressing for 40 minutes is something that no one does in the country.
So it’s definitely a lot different than past Tennessee teams, but it is kind of fun because some alums from the past have said that even though it is so different, it still kind of feels like Tennessee basketball in the way that they get after you defensively and the way they rebound and stuff like that. So it’s really cool to kind of, even though it’s so different, it kind of still relates to the historic brand.
There’s a lot of early offense where I feel like in past years, sometimes it would take longer to get into their sets and it was obviously very centered around a couple stars like Jordan Horston or Rickea Jackson, Tamari Key and now it’s very free-flowing and everybody gets a lot of touches, everybody gets a lot of shots. They’re taking a ton of shots.
They love to kick it out for threes and take way more, I think they’re on a program record pace of attempts per game. They’ve set the program record for threes made in a game, but that’s also just, you know, what the system is tailored to, right? So they look a lot different.
It will be a very fun matchup to see both teams pressing against each other.
LGHL: You talked about all the different players that are part of the side and previous seasons that the offense ran through, but now everyone shoots. Tennessee’s also making these five-player changes at the same time. Who are the players that are standing out or who’s that one player that’s really still a focal point, even though there is such a large committee that is going to be playing?
KNS: Yeah, definitely. Guard Talaysia Cooper is their go-to. Down the stretch, she’s a big name that comes up. Guard Jewel Spear has gotten even better from last year to this year, in terms of just her shooting and creating off the bounce. So she’s absolutely a go-to player for them in crunch moments.
Forward Zee Spearman’s been really big. She really wanted to play like a guard, which is great. And she has that ability. But I feel like often early in the season, she was settling for taking threes instead of really utilizing the handle she has and getting drives in and taking better shots.
So those are three of the players who definitely are go-tos. But I think the thing about this team is there’s so much depth and Kim said it so often that they’re best when everybody’s giving them something, and that’s a 10 player rotation of everybody’s giving you something, whether it’s a couple buckets here or rebounds.
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But yeah, absolutely Talaysia Cooper and Zee and Jewel have been kind their steady producers in terms of scoring. Guard Ruby Whitehorn at times has been a really good scorer for them as well. But yeah, Talaysia Cooper is so important to everything they do on both ends of the floor because she can literally get a steal whenever she wants at the top of the press. And that is such a momentum thing. She’s so important in terms of her defense and she’s a great rebounder. She can facilitate. So she has her hands in everything that they do.
LGHL: At the beginning of the season, there’s an adjustment when you have a new coach, a new system, and some new players playing together. They had a run there where they almost beat Oklahoma, they almost beat LSU, and they almost beat Texas. And then they beat UConn and Tennessee is playing the game that folks expected when Kim joined the team. But then at the end of the season towards the SEC tournament kind of ran into some struggles. What was the underlying issue or what problems were Tennessee running into near the end of the season?
KNS: It didn’t seem like watching them that they were totally gassed going up and down the court every time, but they very clearly had tired legs. And Kim talked about that. She didn’t expect the physical toll of the league that it had on the players. So she, she felt like they didn’t manage their load correctly. And in SEC play, it’s just a grind and you’re just trying to gut it out.
I also think the Kentucky game was really tough to swallow maybe in some ways, just because they were just taking a beating from start to finish. Having played against Kentucky head coach Kenny Brooks last year, he saw this system, Georgia Amoore knew how to break the press, she’s a great point guard. So I think it was also tough to swallow that loss.
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Then being tired, having to come off that loss and losing to Georgia, nothing really seemed right that game, they just seemed very off. And then Talaysia Cooper leaving the game halfway through with a rolled ankle and not coming back was certainly not helpful either.
When they got to the SEC tournament, they looked really good against Texas A&M. But then you play a game the very next day and you’re tired again. They didn’t play up to their standard and they lost to Vanderbilt.
They just needed to get to the break and get their legs back underneath them. Because I think there were also some players playing through some smaller injuries and they were just getting tired. So, because it’s mentally hard to play that system where you have to play so hard every second you’re on the court. And so once you get to that point in the season when your legs are tired, you’re fatigued, it just kind of like spiraled a little bit, especially because those four games were in like a week/two week span. So it was just a lot.
LGHL: Final question. Both Ohio State and Tennessee play a press, slightly different presses, but there are a lot of similarities. I know these teams practice against presses all the time because it’s the systems they run, but when has Tennessee this season played another team that has a similar style press, or have they played anybody this season, and how did they handle it?
KNS: Yeah, there are a few teams in the SEC who will press throughout the game at times.
Auburn did for a little bit but they just didn’t have the depth to keep it up most of the game. Ole Miss pressed a little bit. They didn’t do a lot of full court pressing. Georgia pressed full court a bit. I feel like from what I remember, when they first see it, they don’t handle it well at first.
It might take a quarter for them to adjust and be like, “okay, we just need to pass through this and break it.” So, it’ll be interesting to see how tomorrow goes because I don’t think they have faced a press as good as Ohio State, or as disciplined, where it’s just a well-oiled machine.
They might struggle a little bit at first because they kind of get in their heads a little bit or they’re overthinking it, but then usually they settle in and they can get through it.
It’ll definitely be an interesting matchup. I think honestly, the biggest thing for them is even if they are getting bothered by the press, as long as they aren’t turning into live ball turnovers and losing points that way, I think they’ll be able to weather that.
In the past, when things have spiraled for them, it’s giving up those live ball turnovers. Against LSU that was killing them.
Against Ole Miss, Kim told them, “you could turn the ball over a hundred times, but make sure it’s a dead ball turnover.” They don’t want to give up turnovers in a live situation where they’re going to get beat and get hurt immediately from it. So that will be the key for them tomorrow.