Tennessee Volunteers @ Vanderbilt Commodores Game Preview
By Zach Ragan
Jeff Blake-USA TODAY Sports
Tennessee will look to build on it’s win over South Carolina when they travel to Nashville to take on Vanderbilt Wednesday night. The Commodores are coming off a 67-49 win over Arkansas last Saturday.
Trae Golden had missed the Volunteer’s previous two games before Sunday’s win against South Carolina. Golden was injured in the Vol’s 58-57 win against Vanderbilt on January 29th. Tennessee lack of depth at the point guard position has been a concern and was magnified in Golden’s absence. Although Golden had lost his starting job to Jordan McRae earlier in the season, he was still playing important minutes. Golden played 27 minutes in his return to the lineup against South Carolina, scoring 16 points and turning the ball over twice.
Tennessee still has improvements that need to be made in the turnover department, they had 18 turnovers against the Gamecocks. Tennessee turned the ball over only 9 times against Vanderbilt during the previous meeting, their lowest amount since turning the ball over 8 times in a loss to Ole Miss on January 9th.
Jarnell Stokes will be looking to continue his strong play. The win against South Carolina marked his fifth straight game with a double-double. He now has nine on the season. After missing a considerable amount of time in his first season at Tennessee, the sophomore forward has come into his own as of late. Stokes was named SEC player of the week last week, after scoring 16 points and securing 11 rebounds against Georgia and posting a line of 20 points and 10 rebounds against South Carolina. Head coach Cuonzo Martin has implored the team to get Stokes the ball more, which seems to be paying dividends.
Vanderbilt is one of the lower scoring teams in the SEC, averaging only 59.5 points a game (328th in NCAA). The Commodores are led in scoring by sophomore guard Kedren Johnson, the Tennessee native averages 14.2 points a game.
Tennessee (12-10, 4-6 SEC) and Vanderbilt (9-13, 3-7 SEC) will tip off at 8:00 PM EST on Wednesday night. The game can be seen on the SEC network.