#16 Tennessee 66, Georgia 61 March 3, 2018 | Knoxville, Tenn. | Thompson-Boling Arena
Tennessee Head Coach Rick Barnes
On slowing down Georgia’s offense in the second half: “I thought Georgia was terrific in the first half, I told our team at halftime the I thought we guarded well. This was just a great college basketball game. I thought both teams played their hearts out. They normally average about seven threes a game, but they made six in the first half and I thought some of them were tough shots. But I just said, ‘it’s not going to be easy, it’s not supposed to be easy’ and we stayed with it. In the second half, I do think that our full court pressure helped us turn them over a little bit, and I think we scored off of most of those turnovers. But this is really what March is about, battling every possession, physical game. We rebounded the ball better when we needed to and when we needed stops we were able to get them.”
On what was different down the stretch in this game as opposed to the loss to Georgia two weeks ago: “Well we did get out-toughed down there. And that’s what we told our guys. They knew what they were playing for, and I really did talk about that at some point, we need to break through and beat Georgia. We hadn’t done it since I’d been here, so we talked a lot about that and we talked about why we had been out-toughed. We said that we have to take away those baskets as much as possible. And Yante Maten is such a terrific player. You have to love him and respect every thing about him. I think Mark Fox is a great basketball coach, his teams are hard to play against, they play high percentage basketball, and we knew it going to be tough. We knew it would be. But I think the difference was we were much tougher in the last seven or eight minutes then we were down in Athens.”
On going from missing postseason play a year ago to winning the conference: “I think it’s a compliment to our players. We came back from the SEC Tournament last year and we knew we had to make some changes in the program. We knew the first thing that we were going to have to do was get a group of guys that were totally bought in and had two feet firmly planted in the program. We came back and had the hardest spring we’ve had since I’ve been here. We spent time on the track running, and we did things that I haven’t done in 15 years as a coach, because we were going to find out who really wanted to be a part of this because we feel like this is a great opportunity to be a part of. We expect to win and we expect to be playing in March, and I told them you know what, if we’re not going to be on the court, I’m going to let you know what it’s like to be playing in March. We’re going to work. You don’t ever want to be on spring break if you’re a basketball player. Because if you are, that means you aren’t in postseason play. So when we got back from the SEC Tournament and there were about two weeks left of basketball season, I told our guys that we needed to understand that we wanted to be playing at that time next year. So then we broke, had a good spring, came back in the summer, it was good. The trip to Europe helped us a lot, there’s no doubt about it. We started the season and knew we were going to be played a very demanding schedule again, we knew that. And there was a time when we got going where guys got worried about winning, but we just talked about that if we played the way that we were capable of playing, the wins will take care of themselves. But we’ve gone through some uncharted areas with these guys, they’ve learned how to compete with a number in front of their name because of the ranking. We’ve always said over the last few weeks of the season that the conference race wasn’t over, and we’ll keep playing, get better and see how it plays out. It was tough in here against Florida, but we found a way to win. We knew that sweep through Mississippi was going to be a tough one, and then we obviously don’t do anything without beating Georgia. I told our coaches, if you look at our teams that we had to play twice, it was 10 games. I made the comment to them back before the season started that if we really want to be a contender, we have to find a way to go 8-2 against those teams. We ended up going 9-1. Those 10 games were really important on our schedule, and with all the teams we play, those are really important. The fact that we were able to go 9-1 is in itself a great accomplishment and the reason we are where we are right now."
On Admiral Schofield having a big second half: “He’s an emotional player, you know he is. He’s a junior, he’s put his work in, and I know people work hard, but I’m concerned about us, and I want guys to work. This time of the year, you have to measure it up pretty carefully. I’m a rhythm coach, I want our team to stay in rhythm. I remember the break at Christmas, that’s a tough time because the schedules change, and I found out a lot about this group. We’d go through a period where we would have a day off, and then we weren’t very good in practice. Over the last couple weeks, we’ve been better, and one day they complained about how hard we went, and I said, ‘If you guys want to be pros, your body is supposed to be sore at this time of year.’ From that point on, we’ve had pretty intense practices; shorter but to the point. I know a group of these guys got together one night and had a great meeting, I think that’s helped our team in a positive way. So, there’s been a lot of growth in our team, and Admiral has probably grown as much as anybody since he has been here, in a lot of different areas.”
On this game being a fitting Tennessee win: “Again, I can’t tell you how much respect I have for Mark Fox and his team. They play high percentage basketball, so we knew it was going to be tough. But I thought our guys were locked in, even in the first half, I thought we played good basketball. And I thought they were terrific. I walked off the floor at halftime thinking we didn’t play bad, they were just really really good. But I told our guys we had to grind it out, that’s what we do, that’s the kind of team we are. We knew we were going to stay under pressure, we wanted to keep trying to run, and all that. And in the last six, seven, eight minutes we got into a possession game, and I thought for the most part, to be honest with you, guys have to make plays. And we had some guys make some plays.”
On what he told the team heading into the game: “It’s a basketball game. All of these players prepare the same way. They know what they’re playing for, you guys made sure of that. If you want to be a team that’s there every year, you want to be in this position and it’s not easy to win championships. We have a process we have to go through, and we went through it again last night. We didn’t change anything from the last game to this game, but we talked about what we have for the last three weeks. I actually said to them, ‘If you want to be a champion, you have to win now. You can’t give one away, so if we’re going to lose, let’s make sure somebody beats us.’ And they got locked in, and if you go back to the Florida game, I thought it was a hard played game and then Ole Miss was sloppy, but we found a way to get it done, and they had a great effort at Mississippi State. Today, that was a great college basketball game. It’s sad that somebody had to lose, but I just love the way our guys fought there at the end and got it done. You have to give the players credit. They fought and they were the ones that said, ‘Hey, you got to make plays on both ends of the court, you got to go get it and make the plays.’ And we had different guys doing it.”
On the atmosphere in Thompson-Boling Arena tonight: “It was unbelievable. We were going to try to take that clock down lower, and we got the ball to Admiral probably 10 seconds before we wanted to, and then, I even told them to enter back towards midcourt and keep dribbling, but it was so loud they couldn’t hear. Our fans have been great all year. Our fans have been great since the first time I’ve been here. The last two years we’ve had a group of blue collar guys who have worked hard and Tennessee likes that. They like guys that are just going to go out and give it everything they have. Someone said a great thing the other day cause we were getting ready to play North Carolina and I talked about the buzz being those teams coming in and I heard someone say, ’We’re the buzz’ and that’s a compliment our players because they have the kind of crowd here today to cap off this regular season game here at home is tremendous, and that crowd tonight was great. I heard it. I’ve had so many people tell me that’s what it can be like all the time and that’s what we want but we’ve got to keep doing our part.”
On Lamonté Turner stepping up in clutch moments: “Arguably, he and Admiral put more time in the gym than any players on the team, and they’re competitors. I don’t tell them that often, I tell them that I want to see more, but I know they are. We were on the bench, and that’s why we decided to go with him at the point at the end. I just felt like he showed us that he’s not afraid to. At half time I told him, ‘I want to see you play defense’. He’ll bounce back and he can take hard coaching, and as a staff we know that he’s not afraid of the big moments.”
Tennessee Forward Admiral Schofield
On hitting the final shot: “Well first of all, I wanted to make sure I didn’t turn the ball over, because I knew that Coach Barnes would have been hot with me. It’s whatever you work on. Whatever situation comes, I can’t really explain it. It’s a natural thing. You work on it so much. I tried to attack the basket, and he cut that off, so I spent. I sensed that he was retreating, because I didn’t feel him. I faded away, and that’s a shot I work on all of the time. It’s just another rep. Like my teammates say, ‘Admiral puts in reps’ and that was just another rep for me.”
On being picked 13th in the SEC preseason and getting a share of the SEC regular season championship: “It’s always fun to have the last laugh. Grant and I knew when we were going to SEC media days that those guys had no clue on how much work we put in during the offseason. We had to sit there and listen to it and it was very hard. It was very hard to listen to someone say that we were going to finish second to last, when we put in so much work. We knew that all we had to do was go out and compete and play hard every night and everything else would take care of itself. It’s special because of the bond we built through our work ethic. It’s hard to explain. It’s an amazing feeling. We haven’t won an SEC title since 2008, which is big. We have another goal. We have to go and take care of business in the tournament, which we haven’t won since 1979. The biggest thing for us is taking it one step at a time. Everyday we try to get better. We worry about ourselves and no one else. We go out there and compete for our University, our teammates and our standard.”
Tennessee Forward Kyle Alexander
On his steal as the game was winding down: “He’s a talented player so I tried to stay as close to him as possible. They threw a pass that I felt like I was able to get. I tried to get it, and I got lucky and got the ball. Then Admiral hit a big shot.”
Tennessee Forward Grant Williams
On being picked to finish 13th in the SEC to start the season and using that as motivation for this season: “Honestly, we knew what we were going to do from the get go. We knew we were going to do something special. We played with each other. That’s what we decided to play for. We really didn’t pay attention to any of those rankings. We might have used it every now and again for motivation throughout the year. We knew that it was a different type of environment. It was a different team that we were playing with, a different motive we had. We were successful with it.”
On Coach Barnes being critical of his play in Athens: “He challenged me. Every day he has been challenging me. It gets to you, so you just have to play your heart out and go out there and do what he says and do what you know you can do. I went out there with the mindset that I wanted to prove to myself that I could do something and that I can play well. The past couple of games, I was down on myself. Yeah, I was helping the team and we had some great wins. I got in the mindset that we were champions and that was all we had to focus on. From then on, it was everyone making great plays. Kyle with the steal, Lamonte’s big three, Admiral’s turn around. I was watching the whole thing with three minutes left. I was jumping around and celebrating for them, because these are my brothers. I love them.”
On what it means to be an SEC Champion: “It means the world. It’s a blessing. It is something that we pray about. It is something that we always tell each other that we have the opportunity, and to make the most of it is something that not many teams get to say that they did. We have a long way to go and a long rest of the season. We are excited. It’s not over yet, that’s something that we need to keep telling ourselves. It’s something that we are going to keep telling ourselves. We are excited to see where it goes.”
Tennessee Guard Lamonté Turner
On hitting big shots: “I kind of got off to a terrible start in this game. I let my emotions kind of get the best of me. I felt like I needed to step up for my team. Grant got in foul trouble, and then he fouled out. I felt like I had to step up and make big shots. I was able to.”
On his halftime adjustment: “At halftime, our guys really got on me because I gave up a layup to end the second half, and I’m better than that. I just had to take a deep breath and come out and bring energy to my team, do my job and focus on that, and not focus on scoring or anything like that. I was able to bring energy and everyone collectively came together, and we were able to get stops.”
Georgia Head Coach Mark Fox
On the competitive nature of the game: “It was a very hard-fought game. I thought both teams really competed intensely. We thought it would be a very intense, hard-fought game. Tennessee had a lot to play for, but I thought our team did too and we certainly competed with that in mind.”
On what he has coming up in regards to the SEC tournament: “It’s a new season. We haven’t had as good of a league season as we had hoped, and we will have to regroup and hopefully get hot in St. Louis.”
On how Admiral Schofield and Grant Williams played against Georgia this time as compared to the last meeting between the two teams: “Those kids are good players. They played hard. They had some balls go in today. I thought the free throw shooting today was a big difference. We missed six and they only missed one. I thought that was a big factor in the game.”
On Georgia not getting some shots off in the last two minutes: “We had Donte’ (Williams) in the post and we just threw it to the wrong hand. If we had thrown it to the other side, he probably would have just turned around and laid it in. At the end, obviously Tennessee took away the two options we had for the three-point shot.”
On his attitude moving forward: “We’re going to focus on trying to win the next game. I think our competitive resiliency certainly has been tested throughout the year, but we’ve pretty much answered. We came out and competed hard today, but we just didn’t close the deal.”