Tennessee basketball is looking to bounce back from Tuesday night’s loss against South Carolina when they travel to Lexington to face No. 10 Kentucky on Saturday night.
Ninth-year coach Rick Barnes met with the media on Friday and discussed Tennessee’s issues against South Carolina, previewed the challenge ahead at Kentucky and much more. Here’s everything Barnes said.
More From RTI: Tennessee Basketball Looking To Turn Page Quickly From South Carolina Loss
On Kentucky’s high-scoring offense this season being one of John Calipari’s best
“They’re very explosive and can give it to you from all different levels in all different ways. Great speed. A team that can really go on big runs against you. But I think (Calipari) would probably be happy that he’s getting a little bit more balance all the way around. But really, really, really explosive basketball team. And he obviously present problems. He’s always had a team that would run. We’ve always talked about transition being a big key playing against Kentucky because of how fast they can get down the floor and get in the open court and try to play in space. And so transition defense is really important, obviously, and knowing that they’ve got guys that can, if they get space, they don’t need space. They’ve got some guys that can play off the bounce, but also guys that can really go up and make some very difficult shots.”
On the balance between Tennessee wanting to play fast offensively, but also slowing Kentucky down defensively
“Well, again, I think it’ll be the last two games we played, we played against teams that we’re going to play a more slower, lower possession game. This game, I don’t think it’ll be a lower (possession) game because we’re going to do what we do. They’re going to do what they do. And with that in mind, I think it will be a high-level, high (possession) game.”
On what makes Kentucky so efficient from three-point range
“Well, one, they can shoot the ball. I’d say the same thing about our guys. You know, you want to recruit guys that can put the ball in the basket and hope that they work hard, too, (and) can get themselves set up against good defenses that are trying to take it away from them. But the fact is that, I think that they, again, I’ve always thought (Calipari’s) team was one that looked to attack early. And I think this team is probably like that and maybe quicker, but he’s got guys that can shoot and he’s telling them to shoot it.”
On the reaction from Tennessee players in the last couple days after the South Carolina loss
“We pointed out the things that we didn’t do well. And again, I told you guys before, I could talk about what we didn’t do, but it sounds like sometimes you’re taking away from the team that won the game. And I don’t ever want to do that because we had just as much chance to win the game as South Carolina. They did what they had to do. We didn’t. But you look at what you didn’t do. And, honestly, it’s goes back to things that we’ve talked about all year. Can we be consistent? What can we count on every single night? And whether it’s ball-screen coverage, guys want to take chances when they shouldn’t and just not being sound discipline wise. And like I told them yesterday, as a coaching staff, it’s our job to teach them basketball and their job to learn it. We shouldn’t be talking about some things that we’ve been talking about for two months now.”
On what isn’t working for Josiah-Jordan James right now that was working earlier in the season
“It’ll come back to him. There’s no doubt in my mind. I’ve said it about Jordan Gainey, I’ve said it about every guy that you coach, that they go through it. And all they can do is get in the gym, do what they’ve always done, stay with a routine. And as you know, Jo has been a guy that has worked hard his whole life. And again, he’ll get it going. I don’t have any questions or doubt about that.”
On what led to players sitting around and waiting for Dalton Knecht to create against South Carolina
“If you really think about the game, and I’ll tell you exactly how I explained it to them. You start the game missing layups, that’s like, I actually said, could you imagine the first play of the Super Bowl a running back comes out and fumbles the ball? Then you have three fumbles an then you go back and you try to throw three straight Hail Marys. And the first three threes we took were all good if we had made those shots that we needed to make. And so the teaching point to them was, okay, at some point in time you got to realize the flow of the game, what’s going on, what we need to do. Because we want guys to take shots. We’ve talked about that a lot, but when you start digging yourself in a hole, then you’re down 7-0, whatever it may be, then you say, okay, where do we get somewhere?
And like I told Dalton yesterday, the first three that he took would be a three that you’d take, but being down 7-0 right there, he needed to put pressure on the basket. And that’s part of the learning process, obviously. But we don’t want to lose our aggression but we need— you’re not, if you’re missing 10 shots at the rim and don’t do a good job at the free throw line, that puts you in for a long night and you hope you can find a way to pull it out but we weren’t able to.”
On the importance of avoiding a slow start at Kentucky
“We talk about all that with them, and I just want us to be a confident team. I want us to be a team that I know that we can be. And I want to, if you go back, whether you’re talking about Josiah or Santi or Jordan or Dalton, anybody. I want us to do what we practice and we think if we do what we practice and there will be no undefeated teams in college basketball. And I was watching the game last night against Wisconsin and Nebraska and Wisconsin had won 120 straight games when they had a 15-point lead. Last night all at once, I’ve known (Nebraska coach) Fred Hoiberg for a long time, his team started making some shots, and as a coach you just sit back and think (it’s) one of those nights because they made some really tough shots. And it happens to everybody that stays in it. And what you hope is that at the right time, you keep building and it’s all about getting better and hoping that we can be the best team we can be when it counts most.”
On Jonas Aidoo’s struggles against South Carolina after saying postgame on Tuesday he didn’t know why the junior forward played so poorly
“I don’t because the shots he missed, you guys know he’s been making ’em. He’s a good shooter. He does a lot of good things. I just got off an interview with Joe Rexrode and he was telling me about Jonas’s love for cologne. Got like 60 bottles of cologne. I’m just gonna suggest that whatever cologne he wore the other night, he doesn’t wear it anymore.
“But what I love about what Jonas did, he came back and had a great day of practice yesterday and years passed — he’s done that this year. I think he realizes how important he is to us and what we need him to do, and he wasn’t happy and he knows that those are hard things to overcome. But again, his response was terrific.”
On if there’s a player he would worry less about bouncing back from a poor performance than Zakai Zeigler
“No. It doesn’t matter (if it’s) within a game, he’ll bounce back. But we need a lot of guys to just be the confident players that we want ’em to be and just do the things that we practice and (if) we do that, I promise you we’re gonna win more games than we lose.”
On if there’s more frustration that it’s February and everyone hasn’t played their best at the same time, or if there’s more excitement that there’s more out there for his team
“Well, you’re always excited about the improvement and you hope that you have a team where not all the main guys aren’t, that you’re counting on don’t have good nights. But the fact is we’re in February now, it’s time to go. We’ve said the word consistency a lot and we’ve gotta understand that we’ve gotta control (what we can control). You can’t always control making shots. You can control ball-screen coverage, you can control blocking out, you can control standing in front of the basketball. The things that you can control, you have to control. And from this point on, that’s what we’ve gotta do because everybody we play on our schedule is capable of beating us on any given night if we’re not ready to take those challenges on.”
On what he wants to see from Tobe Awaka to get back on track a little bit more
“Well, again, just understanding what we need him to do night in and night out. And every team’s gonna play differently. You know, some teams are going to stay at home more on the perimeter, take away this guy, that guy, so game to game, he’s gotta make those adjustments the way he’s played. I mean, the opportunities he’s gonna get, he’s gotta be ready for them. With that said, we need him to do it.”
On slowing down Kentucky guard Antonio Reeves
“I don’t know if you can slow any good scorer down. You just gotta hope he’s going to take more good shots than he needs to get what he normally gets. Guys that can really score the ball, you’ve gotta make them work as hard as you can to earn points, knowing that if you’re averaging 20 points a night, that’s tough to guard, but you have to make them work for every one of them and hope that he’s gotta take more shots to get to that number.”
