Tennessee 93 South Carolina 73 Feb. 17, 2021 | Thompson-Boling Arena | Knoxville, Tenn

Tennessee 93 South Carolina 73 Feb. 17, 2021 | Thompson-Boling Arena | Knoxville, Tenn. Tennessee Head Coach Rick Barnes On what he thought of VJ and Fulky’s performance tonight: “Again, the last couple of days of practice we were short of guys, and we just individually kept talking to guys that they have to get themselves involved, because we can only do so much from a coaching staff standpoint. Our offense since Fulky has been here hasn’t changed a whole lot, and if it had changed some, it’s because we have had to take advantage of some other talent. Otherwise, his position really hasn’t changed that much. We said they’re going to have to do it. I thought he did the best job of running tonight that he’s done all year. He really ran the floor hard and again I think he’s got to play quicker in the post, and he is wanting to catch it and spin and do this and that. He’s not going to get time to do that, unless he does his work early. With VJ, the last two days Santi wasn’t able to practice, so those three guys worked together, and I thought it probably helped VJ as much as any the last two days playing the point, and understanding what we want to do, and I thought he did a really good job with it.” On what the last few days were like with COVID circumstances: “Well, we knew regardless if the test results came back, we had to play by rule. We knew two days ago that Josiah wasn’t going to be able to play. Santi hadn’t practiced until shootaround today. We had three guys that didn’t practice, so we just went about practice with the guys we had, and we tried to do some different things. We obviously knew that we were going to get ticket in the game tonight. We were going to get Olivier if we could. We just decided whatever we got we’re going to go play, and that’s how we went about practice the past couple days.” On Josiah’s status moving forward and if he’ll be okay: “He’s okay – we think he’ll be back Saturday and we’ll know more soon, but we think he will be.” On how much he thinks VJ’s offensive aggressiveness helps him play the point, and what else he likes with him at that position: “Well, sometimes when a player stops thinking about making shots and just plays—getting involved, and letting it spin around and get back to them some, get the offense going, and try not to get lost defensively—it happens for you. He had a few defensive breakdowns tonight, and out of the timeout I took him out, and I think he was tired a little bit. But, players go through the ups and downs, and I think we’ve seen more of that this year. I think there’s a lot of inconsistency for a lot of different reasons. There’s nothing normal that any of us are doing, because I can only imagine what South Carolina has gone through the last couple days, and what they went through back earlier in the year. It’s one of those years where there’s no consistency with a lot of things, and in some ways it rubs off on players.” On how important it was for VJ to go back out there and shoot tonight after his recent struggles: “All we ask these guys to do, is do what you do, and do it at a high level, and don’t think you have to do more than you need to do. Just trust each other, play with each other, and play to your strengths. Don’t try to overdo it and understand the game. I think he, Jaden, Keon, and Santi have to adjust to changing defenses throughout the game. Changing team to team. Everybody will play you different, but overall, throughout many years of coaching, I’ve seen guys go through periods like this in the year, and very few of them can maintain it all the way through. Like I told them after the game, now is the time to try to get consistent, and let’s see If we can do it on both ends. We’re getting towards the end of the regular season, so we just need to get consistent.” On the difference between the first and second half for South Carolina on the 3-point line: “Well, the scouting report is some of it, but we gave up a three in the early parts of the game where we didn’t execute our scouting report. It was plain and simple. They made them, and those guys are capable of making it. We tell our guys all the time, we’re going to play some drive-first guys, but even with that, guys at this level can make a shot. We weren’t closing out with a hand up, and just let guys stand out there like they were playing horse. They took the shots, and our ball pressure wasn’t very good early in the game. I thought they were very comfortable on the offensive end doing what they were doing. In the second half we did better guarding the ball, and just trying to let them feel us a bit more. They were down some guys—two key guys—and that hurts any time. I think Frank does a great job, I do. I don’t know if anyone has had a tougher year than he’s had. But it is what it is, and like I said in the first half they made the shots and took the shots they had. I could tell you last time we went out, we had wide open shots that we made in the first half, and in the second half we couldn’t make one. That’s just the game of basketball.” On if he feels like Tennessee is figuring things out on offense: “We had some really, really bad turnovers in the second half. South Carolina had something to do with some of them, but some of them they didn’t. We just had some guys throwing uncatchable passes and trying to squeeze the ball into tight quarters. It’s those things we have to clean up. We have to continue to get guys, like Yves, he has to be an even more aggressive rebounder. But we want to get out and go. We have to do that. It’s important that we do that. Tonight, they were mixing it up between man and zone and we just kept going at them and we were able to get some of those transition baskets. We’re no different than any team in the country, we need those baskets. I think every team in the country needs them. They got some on us too because of transition defense. That happened twice I know for sure tonight.” On Yves Pons and John Fulkerson’s turnaround performances tonight: “We need them both to be aggressive. It’s that simple. That’s not just offensively. We need them to be aggressive defensively, we need them rebounding. That’s two-thirds of our front line most nights. Offensively, they want to get involved. They probably could’ve done a little more tonight, without having to call sets. That position in our offense has a lot of freedom, but you have to get yourself involved.” On the diversity of scoring tonight from his team: “Well, there is no doubt we are better when we have that diverse scoring. What we talk to those guys about is that we need them to score, but we said we need other guys to have that same kind of attitude. We told those guys we know they’re good enough to score but we need them to get the other guys some easy baskets. That’s why some of the passes they threw, they probably should have shot when they tried to feed it in a couple tight spots. When we get that diversity, it’s hard to guard. Playing against teams that have had that ability, it makes it really difficult to guard them.” On how difficult it is to push the ball down the floor without getting out of control: “It is difficult, learning how to play fast. To be honest with you, we haven’t gone up and down the floor since Saturday. That is something we were concerned about, because we thought we’d be short on numbers and we wanted to make sure we saved legs. Early in the game, guys were asking to come out two minutes into the game because it was a fast-pace game. Which we knew it would be. They’re the 10th-fastest team in the country with the pace they play with. It was up and down. As I mentioned, Jaden wasn’t feeling great. Guys were asking to come out. Then they got their second wind, which I thought was important. I really felt going in we would struggle with that early, because we hadn’t gone up and down since Saturday due to the situation we were in. Overall, I’m proud of these guys for their preparation and handling the unknown. We didn’t know with the situation that’s going on until right before shootaround. I’m just really proud of these guys for being locked in and doing what they did.” On what he said to John Fulkerson after he sat him down during a timeout: “Well, he made an excuse on play.

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