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Tennessee Basketball: Vols Host Rival Kentucky Wildcats

By Caleb Calhoun

Jan 9, 2016; Knoxville, TN, USA; Tennessee Volunteers head coach Rick Barnes during the first half against the Texas A&M Aggies at Thompson-Boling Arena. Mandatory Credit: Randy Sartin-USA TODAY Sports
Jan 9, 2016; Knoxville, TN, USA; Tennessee Volunteers head coach Rick Barnes during the first half against the Texas A&M Aggies at Thompson-Boling Arena. Mandatory Credit: Randy Sartin-USA TODAY Sports /
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Tennessee basketball has a tough task under Rick Barnes to get back on track this week. The Volunteers host the Top 20 ranked Kentucky Wildcats Tuesday.

With no inside game, no half court offense, and some pathetic transition defense, the 10-11 Tennessee Vols men’s basketball team is in a very bad state at this point. Rick Barnes’s team blew two significant second-half leads last week, by 15 vs Alabama and by 14 vs TCU, which made for two huge missed opportunities.

Now, they take their erratic three-point shooting and one-dimensional team into the brutal part of their schedule, and that starts with the Kentucky Wildcats and John Calipari coming to town Tuesday.

Normally, we would say this match-up could not come at a worse time for the Vols. But as we have realized, this team will go as far as chance and the law of averages takes them.

All they can do is jack up threes, and if they are hitting, they can win. If they aren’t, they lose.

Kentucky is 16-5 and coming off of a heart-breaking road loss to the Kansas Jayhawks this past Saturday. However, that was against an elite team, and the program appears to have hit its stride with its new players, winning three straight SEC games before that in convincing fashion.

Believe it or not, Tennessee has an advantage against Kentucky’s two best players if Robert Hubbs III shows up to play. He could potentially neutralize Jamal Murray, and Kevin Punter could abuse Tyler Ulis.

But the Vols will unfortunately have no answer for Alex Poythress unless Armani Moore plays out of his mind.

So their only chance is to speed it up even beyond what Calipari does with his team’s, and that should not be a problem given the way Barnes stresses tempo.

But on top of that, they are going to have to hit all of their open looks. If Hubbs shows up and has a big game and Moore plays above his regular level, Tennessee then could have a chance.

But that is a lot of ifs. And nothing about the past two weeks shows any indication that they can consistently shoot a team out of a gym for two halves.

Kevin Punter will once again have a great game, even against Kentucky’s great defense. But it’s not going to come down to him, so have little faith.

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