Tennessee shows up with an attitude

Tennessee’s agenda for the SEC Tournament includes much more than just winning a title for the 18th time in school history and the fifth time in six years.

The second-seeded Volunteers rolled into Verizon Arena in North Little Rock looking to send a message that they are still one of the nation’s best teams and are just as good as top-seeded South Carolina, even without leading scorer Isabelle Harrison, who suffered an ACL injury last month.

Consider the first step taken.

Tennessee held Georgia scoreless for more than seven minutes of the first half Friday night and was never challenged in a 75-41 quarterfinal blowout.

“It’s something that we pride ourselves on,” Tennessee guard Ariel Massengale said. “It’s something that we work a lot on. To come out there and be able to do something like that, to make that happen in a game, it’s very comforting and very rewarding.”

Nia Moore was 6 for 6 from the field and finished with 14 points and Bashaara Graves had 13 points and 11 rebounds for Tennessee (26-4), which held a 47-23 rebounding edge while handing Georgia its worst SEC Tournament loss in school history.

It put the Volunteers into the semifinals for the 22nd consecutive season and one victory away from a potential rematch Sunday with South Carolina.

Tennessee and South Carolina split the regular-season championship.

Georgia (19-12) received the message early in Friday’s game.

After the Bulldogs took a 4-2 lead on Tiaria Griffin’s jumper two minutes into the game, the Volunteers’ defense took over by making 14 consecutive defensive stops, a stretch that lasted almost 7 ½ minutes and allowed Tennessee to take a 17-4 lead.

Griffin was the only person who scored for Georgia for much of the first half. She had nine points while her teammates missed their first 20 shots from the field. Erika Ford, who had 13 points, scored with eight seconds left to make it 32-11 going into halftime.

It didn’t get any better in the second half for Georgia, which shot 27.1 percent for the game and gave up 44 points in the paint to Tennessee, which scored 21 points off 17 Georgia turnovers.

Ariel Massengale and Jaime Nared added 10 points each for the Volunteers, who were more pleased with their defensive performance.