Rick Barnes had no problem with Tennessee basketball’s offense Wednesday.
The rest? Yeah, the Vols coach had a problem with just about everything else. Tennessee gave up 3-point plays, executed poorly defensively, played at half-speed and didn’t compete on the interior.
“That’s a recipe for losing — and that’s what we did,” Barnes said.
The No. 4 Vols flopped in their penultimate SEC game, losing 78-76 at Ole Miss. These are three things that cost Tennessee the most as its chances at a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament spiraled without its trademark defense.
Tennessee was ‘soft’ in handling rim protection
Cade Phillips joined the unfortunate list of Tennessee players who have fouled a 3-point shooter this season. He fouled Jaylen Murray, who made the 3-pointer but missed the free throw as part of Ole Miss’ first and-1 opportunity.
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Tennessee (24-6, 11-6 SEC) gave the Rebels (21-9, 10-7) five more, and they converted all of them.
“It’s ridiculous,” Barnes said. “We talk about having confrontation. We play like we were — that’s soft, honestly. That’s being soft. That’s you not really trying to go in and make plays on the ball.”
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The Rebels had all five and-1 plays in the final 35:56.
Jaemyn Brakefield had three in the final 10:24. He scored nine of his 19 points on those plays. His latter two 3-point plays both tied the game.
“We’ve been a pretty good rim-protecting team this year, but we weren’t tonight,” Barnes said.
Ole Miss rebounded more than half of its second-half misses
Ole Miss guard Sean Pedulla missed a 3-pointer in the final 10 seconds and Tennessee had rebounding position with Jordan Gainey and Jahmai Mashack near the rim.
The ball hit the rim twice and Ole Miss pounced. Brakefield came down with it in a play that summarized Tennessee’s foibles.
The Rebels had 15 offensive rebounds, which led to 14 more field-goal attempts than Tennessee had. They had 11 in the second half on 21 missed shots. Barnes preaches good defense requires ending a possession with a rebound and Tennessee couldn’t get rebounds regularly.
“Offensive rebounding can just take the wind out of your sail,” Barnes said. “They did a great job getting there.”
Ole Miss entered Wednesday as the SEC’s worst offensive rebounding team, getting less than 25% of its misses. It got more than 50% in the second half against Tennessee.
“The way we gave up 78 points, believe me, we deserved to lose this game,” Barnes said.
Ole Miss scored 46 points in the paint against Tennessee
Barnes thought Ole Miss had 46 points in the paint. He was right. The Vols were outscored in the paint 46-20. The Rebels were 16-for-25 on layups and made their only dunk attempt.
“I don’t know what else I can say,” Barnes said. “Just disappointed.”
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Felix Okpara had 13 points and seven rebounds. But Ole Miss consistently got Okpara switched into unfavorable defensive matchups. Barnes assessed it as not being one of Okpara’s better games.
Phillips played only six minutes, committing two fouls. He fouled Murray on the 3-pointer and then committed a foul in the backcourt. Barnes believed Phillips was not locked in.
Ole Miss didn’t make a second-half 3-pointer, but it didn’t need to. It could score easily enough on the Vols to win without 3’s.
“Most of the time in games like this, certainly from where I’m sitting right now, I think you get what you deserved,” Barnes said. “We deserved to lose because we didn’t make enough plays to win the game.”
Mike Wilson covers University of Tennessee athletics. Email him at [email protected] and follow him on X @ByMikeWilson or Bluesky @bymikewilson.bsky.social. If you enjoy Mike’s coverage, consider a digital subscription that will allow you access to all of it.
