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I had to turn it off, but I saw where Santi missed the opportunity to put it away  :frown:

Just awful.   :thumbdown:

Pro: only March matters

Con: March is usually our worst month

Phillips could have dunked it and put the game away....Then Santi misses the front end of a 1&1....Then he leaves his man open in the corner for the game winner...There was a lot that cost us that game before the last 15 seconds.

Got a feeling this team won't sniff the top 10 again this season. This time last week they were ranked 2nd in the country...Lol

Some days you get the bear, some days it gets you. Just don't understand why when these guys get to Knoxville they forget how to shoot. Most of them scored pretty well in high school.

I wonder if they just get wore down.  Playing that hard of defense takes it’s toll maybe.

They did not see any defense in high school.

I thought this team had the opportunity to have the best offensive of the Barnes era.

I think Phillips & to a lesser extent Mashak are the missing link(s). Phillips is apparently so timid offensively he won't take a dunk to seal the game at Vandy. Santiago & Key aren't very intimidating guards. I'm afraid we are in danger of coming totally unraveled the next couple weeks.

Didn't see the game, unfortunately. I know Vandy always plays us tough there, but this is disappointing for sure.

I listened to the game.  It seems to me this was a failure of the defense.  We shot just as well in this game than we did vs UGa.  Little bit of a fluke, added in.  But I'd say one of the first times our D let us down.

We had no real answer to their big guy (who could also hit treys) and collapsing on him opened up the 3 point line, which they exploited big time
Having Zakai in foul trouble didn't help and when he got back in the game I felt he pressed too much
Our offense, while scoring better, was disjointed all night
The only reason we had a lead was Vescovi caught fire and had around 10 straight points

Its amazing teams can have a good big man and even Vandy had one that hurt us....Bruins Barnes hasn't had one more than very average in the 8 years he's been at UT.

Bruin Barnes  :dielaughing:

Im missing the joke. A Bruin is literally a bear or the mascot of UCLA.

So this is funny...why?

you forget he almost became the coach of the Bruins
You might check out the memory clinic  :naughty:

I just thought it was a funny dig at Barnes by TNPhil. I like Barnes. He has been great for UT. Would love to see him win it all & get that monkey off his back.

I'd just like to see him get out of the first weekend...Something he's only done 1 time in the last 14 years. With this team the odds is its going to be 1 out of 15.  Pretty sad for a top 5 paid coach in the country.

Eh, I did forget that. Mostly cause it wasn't that big a deal.

We'll go 1-5 over these last 6 if we don't get our shizzle together. Even back in December, I kept looking at our backloaded schedule and knew February would be a challenge. But I didn't expect a complete meltdown. :banghead:

I would not say a fluky one point loss on a ridiculous shot is a meltdown, but the bleeding does need to stop.

This team was down 17 at one point in the second half, at home as a double digit favorite. I’m not sure that I would call this a fluky loss.

My hope is that these two losses lights a fire under the team.

It may not have been a big deal to you, and that’s perfectly acceptable, but to others it was/is.

We have had at least four (4) bad loses already, none seem to have had any kindling associated with them

They came back from that deficit as good teams do.  Terrible performance in the first half, but they recovered.  I will add that Tareke Key's performance is very encouraging and I hope he becomes a go to guy in the future from the 3-line.

Yes, it absolutely was fluky at the end.  There is no excuse for the lane violation, which, IMO is the avoidable and also proximate cause of the loss.

I am going to push back strongly on "there was no defense on the 3 point shooter".  There absolutely was.  I just saw the replay.  He was guarded the entire length of the court. At the end, he got just enough space to take a 40-45 footer, IMO because our guy didn't believe he would take it from that distance.

If they are going to take a shot that is less than 10% on average to be made and we are moving to guard a closer shot, I think I can be okay with that.

And yes, the combination of having a frosh (who should still know better!) do a lane violation and hitting a shot that is probably 8% or something on average is the very definition of fluky.

I think a lot of fans are just butt hurt that we lost and not thinking clearly.  Missouri got really lucky on this one.  Vandy had some things fall their way also.  Anytime it comes down to one shot, its a coin toss that we lost, at best (but in this case it was like rolling snake eyes).

I am more concerned about the losses to Florida and Kentucky than I am these last two.  These kind of games happen.  Missouri is a really good and underrated team and Vandy always plays us tough in Nashville (they beat us when we were no. 1 and almost did it again and had losing records both times, I seem to recall).

I say go ahead and take a 45 footer and good luck making it.

But please do watch the replay. I will be happy to post pics if you want.

edit: went back and instead of guessing, visually estimated the distance using the 15 foot lane as a reference. I would say 35 feet.  Point remains the same!  :naughty:

Finally we saw the Key that we all hoped for after the Zags game.

We can agree to disagree on what is and is not fluky.

Mashack ran with him the entire court. If you call that defense then we have a different definition of the term. I would say that he shadowed him. When you defend, you actively attempt to turn the ball handler or alter his movement.

Or possibly just have a different opinion than you?

Personally, I’m much more concerned about the next six games on the schedule. This team has lost 4 games where they were double digit favorites. That is concerning.

Thanks for the offer, but I re-watched the last play multiple times immediately after it happened. I have no need for your pics. 🙄

Yep.  Was going to say the same, but you beat me to it.

As for the defense, a foul is also bad and I think you have to factor that in also.  Just saying though, that when you and TnPhil originally commented on it, it sounded like there was no one on the shooter at all.  Instead you meant you thought his coverage a bit loose.  Maybe so, but he was generally within a few feet of the shooter. 

But anyway, I think horse is dead.  :biggrin: