ND/TENN - Who Do You Want To Win?

[Tonyc]

From watching tonites game. A lot of shots by both teams taken from inside 15 ft. That wont happen against UConn.

 

[Bayareahusky]

Well I said on this thread before the game, that I thought UT would play well (which they did for a half anyway), but still would lose by 14 (ok I was 2 pts off!).....

Wow, another post gamer presser I am sure with Holly saying "we just didn't bring the energy in the second half.... we have to learn from this"..... Did you hear the announcers..... they were spot on..... with their words for the LVs...... I made note of their words.... among them.... "Confidence can't flow with ever possession" and "You can't just play when things are going your way" I mean..... where is their consistency? As the announcers noted...... they were jogging down the floor as ND was fast breaking..... when ND big fnished a fastbreak, there was not even a UT big in the picture frame..... on the contrary, (Cable) I think it was..... hustled back to steal from Simmons on a gimme 2 on 1......

Again, why can't Tenn play only when thy shoot 60% from the field as they did in 1st half...?? I continue to believe that the LV coaches are far deficient.... it is either that ... or they have terrible players..... which I do not believe..... Wonder what Margo has to say about this performance... about the EFFORT in particular .

 

[John Glass]

It's called a half time pasting by your coach

Why did McGraw wait until halftime ? Tennessee must have had 12 uncontested lay-ups in the first half, Notre Dame was lucky to be down just 5 at halftime.

 

[DobbsRover2]

Again, why can't Tenn play only when thy shoot 60% from the field as they did in 1st half...?? I continue to believe that the LV coaches are far deficient.... it is either that ... or they have terrible players..... which I do not believe..... Wonder what Margo has to say about this performance... about the EFFORT in particular .

As the announcers noted at the end, Warlick will use the game as a learning experience, and it is good to get schooled a lot like the Vols have been lately so that they are the best educated players in the nation by the end of the season, even if they can't use their diplomas to win any big games.

Again the guards are just wildly out of control. At the 11:30 mark of the 2nd half, Massengale just dives into some ND players (it is not a flop to do this, however, as C-zone says offensive players don't flop) to get a foul call, and that was one of their better offensive sets. Shortly afterward, Simmons launches a crazy 3 from the top of the arc and flails to the floor (but this is not a flop because C-zone says offensive players do not flop) but does not get the call, so on the long rebound to ND and breakout all Simmons can do is watch everyone go by on the way to 2 more points for ND. Just mass confusion for the Vols in the 2nd half and bystander defense.

 

[Phil]

Did Jewell get hurt? Anyone know what happened?

Yeah they showed it on replay, Jones stepped on her ankle while running up court. My guess is she will be sore the next day or two, then be OK.

 

[Fightin Choke]

Why did McGraw wait until halftime ? Tennessee must have had 12 uncontested lay-ups in the first half, Notre Dame was lucky to be down just 5 at halftime.

I don't think Muffet waited. Not much time had elapsed in the game before Loyd left after picking up her second foul. Muffet was afraid of going man-to-man because of either (1) the LV's speed or (2) picking up more fouls. So Notre Dame went to zone and the Vols feasted on it.

After halftime, Muffet had the starters back and made adjustments and the Lady Vols didn't have much success on offense or defense. It was a scary game for a while for an Irish fan, but then it got better (until Jewell's ankle injury).

 

[DaddyChoc]

I said they'll beat them by 17... they won by 16

 

[RadyLady]

Why did McGraw wait until halftime ? Tennessee must have had 12 uncontested lay-ups in the first half, Notre Dame was lucky to be down just 5 at halftime.

I don't know. Maybe because they are trapped into a locker room with no distractions and they listen better. I hear the words "half time adjustments" frequently.

 

[ocoandasoc]

The game's been over for an hour but a TBA security team is still searching the building trying to find the Lady Vol team that played the first 18 minutes of the game.

 

[Bayareahusky]

Yeah Jewell's ankle.... one of those things that happens.... like KML's elbow..... good sportsmanship by the TB crowd

DobbsRover, good comment on guard play..... I think maybe YOU should be coach! Hopefully for you guyz the ship can be righted be4 tourney time.....

 

[DobbsRover2]

Yeah Jewell's ankle.... one of those things that happens.... like KML's elbow..... good sportsmanship by the TB crowd

DobbsRover, good comment on guard play..... I think maybe YOU should be coach! Hopefully for you guyz the ship can be righted be4 tourney time.....

Likely a chia pet can do a better job of coaching the Vol guards, at least as the game wears on. And if I were a Vol fan, I'd almost be rooting against Simmons to make any shot because when she does get a shot to fall she goes crazy afterward and makes a lot of insane drives ending with a flippy throw-up shot that has no control. Lots of energy, but just not focused.

Guessing maybe a bad sprain for Loyd, but hopefully nothing torn. The replay was ugly, but it didn't look like the lower leg stuck in that way you sometimes see with that unmentionable injury.

 

[pap49cba]

I made a point of watching Russell. She cannot get up and down the court. UConn would run her into next month.

 

[msf22b]

I made a point of watching Russell. She cannot get up and down the court. UConn would run her into next month.

Speaking of conditioning…

 

[dtbtbtb]

What a strange game! In the first half TN looked like a great team (shooting very well, passing really well, energy, team play and support) and ND looked slow, lost and not into the game and second half the exact opposite. Strange...one thing that I noticed in the second half was that the ND posts were parked in the lane for longer than 3 seconds and never called for it

 

[Bayareahusky]

Remember when in Stef's freshman year she was winded early in games early on..... then 2nd half of year she hit the weight room and conditioning program set a different tone.... perhaps we will the same in Mercedes?.

I just saw Holly's postgame..... it actually was pretty good..... only one silly statement I saw..... She started out by saying "I loved our energy..... I loved our effort!!" no qualification of only one half. I think, IMHO, it is going down a slippery slope when you commend your team when they showed neither energy OR effort in the second half..... It is just the wrong message... I would have at best said nothing... maybe her praise is related to something else she mentioned in her postgame ... said that her team was very sensitive....

 

[DaddyChoc]

GREAT GAME... Tenn looked good in the first half and the Irish got it together in the 2nd half. nice clean game.

Mabrey and Cable played well and so did Izzy (in the first half)

also nice to see Niele Ivey

 

[Icebear]

Yeah Jewell's ankle.... one of those things that happens.... like KML's elbow..... good sportsmanship by the TB crowd

DobbsRover, good comment on guard play..... I think maybe YOU should be coach! Hopefully for you guyz the ship can be righted be4 tourney time.....

It has been the guard play for more than half a decade. If you do not watch the next game and post after the game that the guard play cost them the game or almost cost them the game the odds of being correct are really, really good.

 

[msf22b]

Margo is up with her postgame views.

Her big beef:
Is upset by the open 3-point shooters in the UTenn zone.
Says it's been the same for 5 yearsa
Notes that they could have been beaten by Mississippi St, Georgia and NC if those teams would have made their open 3's.

Loved the Lady Vols first-half; said it was the best half of the year.
Said the team must become a 40-minute team for them to do better in tournaments.
Gave a shout-out to ND and complimented sommon's first half

 

[DaddyChoc]

I made a point of watching Russell. She cannot get up and down the court. UConn would run her into next month.

not impressed at all

 

[Icebear]

not impressed at all

She was almost invisible.

 

[DaddyChoc]

She was almost invisible.

as usual from the games I peeked at

 

[bschwartz]

Over in Vole Land they are beating up their team and coaching staff in about equal measure.

This may be the strangest quote I have ever seen from a coach:
"It feels like this team is very sensitive," Tennessee coach Holly Warlick said. "We want it so much that it's almost detrimental to us. We want it so badly. I would love to see how we'd play when everybody's clicking on all cylinders. It would really be a lot of fun, but that's up to me, to put them in positions and to get them ready for the next game."
LINK

 

[EricLA]

Wish I cared enough to subscribe to The Summitt. I'd love to read the change from ecstatic to despairing.

It was EPIC. But a good number of teams still have faith that the team can "grind for 9". Funny thing about that - Tenn build their big lead partly because Simmons and Massengale were like 100% from beyond the arc. 6-6 total, or maybe 6-7 in the half. Knew that wasn't going to continue. Oh and they think they should have fed the ball all game to Russell, because, you know... she got game...

 

[EricLA]

This may be the strangest quote I have ever seen from a coach:
"It feels like this team is very sensitive," Tennessee coach Holly Warlick said. "We want it so much that it's almost detrimental to us. We want it so badly. I would love to see how we'd play when everybody's clicking on all cylinders. It would really be a lot of fun, but that's up to me, to put them in positions and to get them ready for the next game."
LINK

That actually makes sense. The team knows on paper they have so much talent - heck, people have been telling them that all year, and players certainly are aware of how many AA's are on their own team and how good they are supposed to be.

Just my $.02... This is what happens to a team that is not taught to think on the court. They run their stuff, make some plays, but when it stops working (ie. the other team adjusts), they panic and start playing rushed. Confidence goes out the window. The are in a way the anti-UCONN. Remember the first half vs. Stanford in the NC game? Worst half of UCONN basketball I've ever seen. Team regained their mojo, confidence, etc. and rolled the 2nd half.

Anyway, the more ND scored, the more panicked TN became, and it was like a house of cards - just toppled in on itself. MOST teams are not taught to think, like UCONN players are. BUT when you have a superior coach like Muffett, you can see the result. It will be very interesting to see how Tennessee fares against coaches like Mitchell or Blair - who I think have sound basketball minds. Tennessee has way more talent than either of those 2 teams, but somehow their kids just don't "get" it. But it all starts with coaching and team preparation for games. AND in making adjustments when you see things going sideways.

Interestingly, Tennessee got up with both of ND's guards on the bench, correct? IF the fouls had gone a little differently, the first have might have been a big ND blow out as well. So you have Massengale and Simmons missing 0 shots in the 1st half, and ND's backcourt on the bench in foul trouble, and the best Tennessee can do is a 5 point lead. And ND closed the lead a lot in the last 4 minutes of the half. Went from down 12 to down 5. Momentum was changing and Tennessee couldn't stop it in the 2nd half.

With no additional adjustments coming from the Tennessee coaches, all they could do was watch in horror as their team was destroyed. Tennessee fans see a lot of hope for their team "if they can put together 40 complete minutes". Problem is, you start 1 senior and 2 juniors. Burdick is an upper classman, and Jones, Graves, Moore and Carter are all sophomores. These kids should not be this far from putting together a complete 40 minute game. Geno has talked about the "big leap" from freshman to sophomore year. We have seen that with Jefferson. Not so much with Tennessee's sophomore class.

We lament when UCONN has a craptastic game like the one they played vs. Baylor, basically without Morgan and KML (who was ineffective), and win by 11. But this Tennessee team was just destroyed by ND on national TV. Teams are never going to be 100% on for 40 full minutes. I'm not sure even this UCONN team has played a complete 40 minutes of demolishing the other team literally every 4 minute segment. And this UCONN team is way better coached than Tennessee...

 

[EricLA]

The game's been over for an hour but a TBA security team is still searching the building trying to find the Lady Vol team that played the first 18 minutes of the game.

Post of the week, maybe of the month! I actually laughed out loud. My dog thinks I'm nuts...