On Thursday, Lady Vols basketball suffered a potentially demoralizing loss to Mississippi State at home. Tennessee went into the game alone at the top of the SEC, but fell completely flat and lost to the Bulldogs 77-62.
Now, it won’t get any easier. The Lady Vols are scheduled to play No. 1 UConn on Sunday. Not only are the Huskies considered the best team in the country after a championship season, but they’ll likely be hungry to get revenge after falling to Tennessee in Knoxville last season.
Kim Caldwell’s challenge is to make sure the tough loss to Mississippi State doesn’t snowball into this weekend. She’s fully aware that there’s a chance it will, though.
“It very well could,” Caldwell said. “They have to make up their mind and fix it. We’ve been harping about rebounds. We’ve had a bubble on the rim to where our practice guys haven’t been able to make a shot. We’ve really focused on it. And until they see it’s a problem and they see that it hurts us, it’s gonna continue to hurt us.”
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In preparation for UConn, Caldwell is first looking to fix what’s wrong with her team before diving too much into the opponent. She noted that if they don’t, they’re ‘gonna get ran out of the gym in the first quarter.’
Then, it’s identifying what the Huskies are doing so well. UConn plays in a weak conference and has blown out inferior opponents all month, but do hold quality wins over Louisville, Florida State, Ohio State, Michigan, USC, Iowa and Notre Dame in out-of-conference play.
UConn is led by Sarah Strong this season, a candidate to win national player of the year awards. She is averaging 19.1 points and 8.0 rebounds per game on 60.2% shooting from the field, 39.1% on 3-pointers and 91.8% at the free throw line.
Tip-off is scheduled for noon ET and will air on FOX.
