Jackson stars for Lady Vols

University of Tennessee women’s basketball coach Kellie Harper said her team looked “comfortable” with its offensive scheme Sunday afternoon while making host Liberty “uncomfortable” on the court. The outcome reflected Harper’ assessment, too. Rickea Jackson led all scorers with 21 points in her second game back from injury, Tess Darby had career highs with 18 points and six 3-pointers, and the Lady Volunteers won 90-55 in wire-to-wire fashion in Lynchburg, Virginia. “I felt like our team was really clicking,” Harper said in her postgame news conference. “I thought we were very focused on both ends of the court, and I thought we made Liberty uncomfortable, which helped us.” Tennessee (7-5) played for the first time since its 85-63 win against Wofford in Knoxville on Dec. 19. The road win against the Lady Flames (5-10) of Conference USA was the Lady Vols’ last game before opening Southeastern Conference play at Auburn on Thursday, with tipoff set for 8 p.m. Eastern. The Lady Vols have won three in a row since losing four of five to fall below .500 and out of the rankings, and they settled in from the start at Liberty, scoring the first eight points of the game and leading 25-9 at the end of the first quarter. It was 43-24 at halftime and — after a third quarter in which Tennessee shot 63.6% from the field and 55.6% from 3-point range — 76-43 entering the fourth. Jackson, who played just the first two games of the season before being sidelined by injury for more than a month, shot 9-for-18 from the field with a pair of 3-pointers and matched Tamari Key’s team-high seven rebounds. Darby was 6-for-9 from 3-point range as the Lady Vols finished 12-for-30 behind the arc, and she and Jackson were joined as doubledigit scorers for Tennessee by Kaiya Wynn (12 points) and Karoline Striplin (10).