Lady Vols basketball went on the road to play Ole Miss in a ranked matchup but came up short. While never leading and trailing by as much as 26 points, Tennessee lost 94-81.
After the game, Lady Vols head coach Kim Caldwell met with the media. She was asked about what went wrong, the adjustments she wanted to make and more.
Here’s what she said.
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Opening statement
“Yeah, coming into the game, we talked about guarding in the paint and limiting our fouls, and we didn’t do that tonight, and it really, really hurt us.”
On Cotie McMahon scoring 39 points
“Yeah, the game plan coming in was put three or four people around her, make it really hard for her to get to the rim. We fouled her way too many times. She scored any type of way she wanted to. A lot of it was in transition, and we just didn’t have bodies in front of her.”
On the halftime adjustments, why they didn’t work
“We wanted to just get back in transition and, again, try to get feet in the paint, try to stop them at the rim, stop their fouls, continue to push pace on offense. So, really working on guarding the ball in transition.”
On the consistent problem with transition defense
“I think being willing to go over and take a charge, being loaded to the ball, having multiple people. We struggled tonight guarding one-on-one. Again, kind of like our game plan in Texas, we wanted to be in those gaps. We wanted to play team defense as a unit. Tonight, it didn’t matter. I mean, when they did it in the half court, they did it in the full court. But when they’re going in transition, we need more people loaded to the ball and to be physical on the inside and to do it without fouling.”
On if she’s surprised the team fell into a big hole after the Texas game
“I think we, we rallied. I think we fought towards the end. I think we got off to a really slow start offensively and then our offense wasn’t really the problem. It was getting stops.”
On getting Zee Spearman back in the mix
“I think we need to get her more looks early and then work on being physical at the rim when she’s on the inside or putting her on the outside and then creating space for her and letting her go, kind of like she did against Georgia. She was driving more from the three and she’d been posting up against the zones we’ve seen.”
On the breakout game for Lauren Hurst
“I thought she was a great spark for us tonight. We were on her about not shooting vs. Texas, and she went out there, and she shot the ball with confidence. She rebounded well. She was physical on the inside. I thought she looked like she belonged on the floor in a big game, and I was really proud of her effort tonight, and hopefully that will carry over.”
On the short turnaround going in, the short turnaround after
“Yeah, I mean, we have one more at the end of this stretch, and then we’ll have a day off after. So we have to regroup. Again, we’re knocking these out here, so just gotta take what we need from this one and get ready to your next scout.”
On if she feels better about this loss compared to others
“I mean, it could have got there. So I’m happy that it didn’t get there, but no, you’re not happy with any loss. We obviously wanted to come win this one. This is one we wanted to win.”
On the biggest thing that has to change
“I think our, our transition defense is going to be the biggest point of emphasis. Box out, second-chance points, and doing it without fouling are going to be really important in all of those matchups that we have left.”
On getting Janiah Barker back in the mix
“Yeah, I think that we didn’t have great offensive flow at the beginning, and just being patient and taking what comes to you and playing within the offense. I think she’ll be fine. I’m not too worried about her production, her performance. I think she’ll bounce back.”
