Vols not without questions during lengthy break; Walker enters portal
After a 12-game start to a basketball season overflowing with frequent-flier miles following trips to Wisconsin, Hawaii, North Carolina and Texas, the Tennessee Volunteers are finally catching their respective breaths with a 9-3 record and a No. 8 ranking in the Associated Press poll.
Tennessee players are getting five days away from the hardwood coming off Thursday night’s 65-46 victory over Tarleton State inside the Food City Center, and the Vols don’t play again until hosting Norfolk State on Jan. 2. Tennessee opens Southeastern Conference competition Jan. 6 by welcoming No. 25 Ole Miss.
The Vols were the preseason picks to win the SEC and are currently the league’s highest-ranked team, but their longest break between games this season does not come without concerns, with fifthyear senior guard and Northern Colorado transfer Dalton Knecht at the top of that list. The 6-foot-6, 213-pounder averaged 19.2 points a game through Tennessee’s first nine contests but has averaged 5.0 in the past three.
“He’s going to have to understand that when he’s not shooting the ball, he can impact games in other ways,” Vols coach Rick Barnes said Thursday night in a news conference. “I think he’s always put everything into scoring the ball, but he’s seeing some things that he’s never seen before in terms of physicality. He doesn’t have to score it. He just needs to make good plays.
“He’s capable of doing it, because there is nothing he can’t do.”
Knecht raised national eyebrows Nov. 29, when he matched a Dean Dome record for an opposing player by scoring 37 points during a 100-92 loss at North Carolina. He had 21 points in Tennessee’s 86-79 topping of Illinois on Dec. 9, but his past three performances have yielded a combined 5-for-21 shooting performance.
“Everybody knows each other’s games by now. We spent so much time together before the season started. We’re at a point where we just know each other so well.”
– FIFTH-YEAR SENIOR GUARD SANTIAGO VESCOVI
Although the likes of Kansas, Purdue and UNC are in the rearview mirror for the Vols, the conference schedule can often present more of a grind.
“We’ve told him once we get to SEC play that it gets a lot more physical and a lot more athletic,” fifth-year senior guard Santiago Vescovi said. “We know he’s trying, so we’ve just got to have his back. He’s good, but he’s just got to figure stuff out on the court in terms of the physicality.
“We know he’ll do it, and we’ll help him with it.”
Another dynamic for the Vols during this time off involves the inside tandem of junior forward Jonas Aidoo and sophomore forward Tobe Awaka. Aidoo has started in all 12 games and bounced back from fouling out against Purdue and North Carolina with a career-best, 29-point outing against Georgia Southern on Dec. 12, but he hasn’t been able to maintain that momentum.
In Tennessee’s past two games, Aidoo and Awaka have each played 42 minutes. In the two games before that, Aidoo logged 58 minutes to the 31 from Awaka off the bench.
“If you go back over our last two games, Jonas has given up some points in there,” Barnes said. “Bigger and stronger guys have been able to move him and put him where they want him, and that’s something he’ll have to continue to work on. Guys have been able to get down under him and move him, and there is no doubt that Tobe is stronger.
“The best thing Tobe is starting to do is learning how to switch, and that will bode well.”
Tennessee more than holding its own against a taxing nonconference schedule has transpired with junior point guard Zakai Zeigler coming off the torn ACL he suffered in February and with Vescovi having to head home to Uruguay just before the start of the season due to the death of his grandmother. Awaka, Knecht and junior guard and USC Upstate transfer Jordan Gainey have played through ankle injuries, but the Vols should be at full strength for the dawn of 2024.
Fifth-year senior guard Josiah-Jordan James is enjoying the most consistent stretch of his career, and his versatility is often matched by junior guard Jahmai Mashack.
“Everybody knows each other’s games by now,” Vescovi said. “We spent so much time together before the season started. We’re at a point where we just know each other so well.”
The Vols have a favorable start to league play, with winnable trips to Georgia and Mississippi State following the Ole Miss opener. It’s just that a team already feeling good about itself would feel even better if Knecht could go back to erupting on any given night.
“He can’t let the fact he’s not making shots impact the other end of the court,” Barnes said. “He’s going to have to figure out how to get fouled. He’s got to understand he can get offensive rebounds and score that way.
“If he’s just going to wait thinking he’s going to score it every time he has the ball in his hands, then he is going to be frustrated.”
Walker enters portal
Tennessee fifth-year senior safety Wesley Walker entered the transfer portal Friday and will play elsewhere for his extra season of eligibility allowed by the NCAA following the coronavirus outbreak.
The 6-1, 200-pounder out of Nashville’s Ensworth High School began his career at Georgia Tech and spent three seasons with the Yellow Jackets. He tallied 36 tackles and 5.5 tackles for loss last year with the Vols and added 53 tackles and 3.5 TFLs this season.
Walker is Tennessee’s 10th scholarship player and the seventh defensive back to enter the portal since it opened Dec. 4.