Vols ready to take first step toward NCAA title
KNOXVILLE — Sixteen years later, the moment remains both vivid and significant to Tennessee basketball coach Rick Barnes.
He was the Texas basketball coach in those days, overseeing a terrific team led by superb point guard T.J. Ford. But on this particular day at the 2003 Big 12 Tournament in Dallas, a Texas Tech team coached by Robert Montgomery Knight had gotten the best of the Longhorns, much to Barnes’ chagrin.
Yet when he met up with Knight at midcourt for a postgame handshake, the
Hall of Fame coach pulled
Barnes close and said to him, “Now go win the national championship.”
Recalled Barnes on Monday afternoon during a media session at Tennessee: “We didn’t win it, but we did get to the Final Four that year.”
In other words, no one in Big Orange
Nation should be overly concerned about Sunday’s Southeastern Conference tournament final loss to
Auburn, however humbling that 84-64 defeat against the Tigers was.
“Win or lose,” Barnes said, “you’ve got to flush it out.”
For every team still standing in college basketball, the next loss is the last one of the season. That’s as true for Tennessee as it is for its Friday afternoon opponent in the opening round of the NCAA South Regional in Columbus, Ohio — Colgate. No mulligans from here on out.
“From now on it’s one and done,” two-time SEC player of the year Grant Williams said after Barnes concluded his comments. “The best team is the team that plays together.”
With the possible exception of the loss to Kentucky in Rupp Arena and Sunday’s fiasco against Auburn, Tennessee has played together as well or better than any team in the country from the start of the season. That cohesiveness has led to a victory over then-No. 1 Gonzaga on a neutral court in December and a 19-game winning streak.
On Sunday it led the NCAA Selection Committee to make the Volunteers the highest rated No. 2 seed in the field. Had UT beaten Auburn it reportedly would have earned a No. 1 seed in the West Regional.
But being a No. 2 to top-seeded Virginia in the South Regional is no bad consolation prize. Especially when the regional final will be played in Louisville’s Yum! Center, roughly 250 miles from the UT campus.
“We want to go all the way,” Williams said with a grin. “But for two games not to go our way (LSU on the road and Auburn in the SEC tournament, those losses denying the Vols both the regular-season and SEC tourney titles), doesn’t mean this season isn’t a success. How many teams get 29 wins in a season?”
It has been a remarkable season, whatever happens from this point forward. And Barnes, much like Williams, wants both the fans and his players to savor what is past as much as what lies ahead.
“Don’t ever take this for granted,” the coach said more than once. “It’s special to be a part of this.”
As a younger coach at Providence and Clemson, Barnes admitted he sometimes made experiencing March Madness more difficult on his players than it needed to be.
“I probably compounded the pressure,” he said. “They aren’t going to play perfect. There’s never been a perfect game played in this tournament. Villanova over Georgetown (in 1985) was pretty close to perfect, but even that wasn’t totally perfect. So just go play. Keep doing what got you there.”
What’s most gotten the Vols to this point is camaraderie, experience and teamwork. It’s what has won them those 29 games overall. It’s also what made it possible for them to come from eight down with 2:45 to play Saturday afternoon in their 82-78 comeback win over Kentucky.
“We have a lot of players that have developed their games and are able to shoot the ball as well as go inside and finish over length,” Williams said in explaining why these Vols are better than last year’s model, which lost in the round of 32 to eventual Final Four Cinderella Loyola-Chicago.
“So I think we’re more equipped in that aspect and also mentally. Now we’re mature and Coach Barnes has done a great job in developing us as people. We’ve learned how to deal with success and with tough losses.”
The last loss of the year is always the toughest, and it can come suddenly and unexpectedly for anyone in the field. A No. 16 can even beat a No. 1 seed, as happened a year ago for the first time when the Maryland-Baltimore County Retrievers shocked Virginia.
But Barnes didn’t sound like a coach consumed by such negative thoughts heading into the Colgate game, or whatever might follow that.
“When you look at where we are right now,” he said, “we have had a terrific season, but we want more.”
So do 67 other teams heading into the first two of the First Four games tonight in Dayton, Ohio, including Belmont versus Temple. But wanting it and having the ability to achieve it are two different things.
Said Barnes of the latter: “We have a chance to do it.”
If his Vols can find a way to play as they did against Kentucky on Saturday rather than against Auburn on Sunday, they might have a really good chance.