SEC Tournament: 5 Takeaways from Tennessee Vols Loss to Georgia Bulldogs

Tennessee basketball lost its first SEC Tournament game to Georgia on Thursday. Here are five takeaways from the Volunteers’ loss to the Bulldogs.

Well that ended quickly. The Tennessee Vols lost their first SEC Tournament game to the Georgia Bulldogs 59-57.

It was a hard-fought game from the start, and both teams were fighting to keep their season alive.

But with the ball at the end of the game down by two, the Vols could only get one shot off and came up short.

With the loss, Rick Barnes’s team finishes 16-16 on the year, while Georgia improves to 19-13 and advances to the next round to face the Kentucky Wildcats.

Here are five takeaways from the Vols’ SEC Tournament loss to the Dawgs.

1. Everybody panicked in crunch time.

To be fair to this team, they did stay in the game. But the final possession showed just how much growing up this Tennessee basketball team has to do. The Vols had the ball down by two points with 25 seconds left, and they only got one shot off.

They kept passing it around the perimeter trying to get something, and it ended with Admiral Schofield missing a three-point shot at the end of the game. How did their final possession come down to Schofield taking the game-winning three? It was inexcusable, and while the Vols showed some mental toughness at times in close games this year, they panicked in unacceptable fashion on Thursday.

2. Robert Hubbs III being hurt clearly cost this team down the stretch.

After struggling against the LSU Tigers and finishing the game on the bench against the Alabama Crimson Tide, Robert Hubbs III could not get anything going in this game. He finished 3-for-11 with only six points, indicative of his decline down the stretch of the season.

Barnes announced early in February that Hubbs was battling injuries, and it was right around that time that the Vols’ play started to turn for the worst. Meanwhile, Hubbs continued to look worse with each game, and in very sad fashion, his final game in orange was one of his worst.

3. The Vols’ guards showed up. 

Usually, if two guards show up and score, that spells good news for Tennessee basketball. It happened today with Jordan Bone and Lamonte Turner, as both finished the game scoring in double figures.

Meanwhile, Bone also added five assists and only had one turnover, so he played well throughout the game. However, the guards didn’t have help from Hubbs, whom we have already mentioned has clearly been hurt, and they also dealt with bad play from another source.

4. The forwards played out of control.

For Tennessee basketball to win games this year, they needed Robert Hubbs III to shoulder the scoring load, have one or two other guards show up, and then get major production from a big man. Hubbs was hurt, and no big man really stepped up in this game. Admiral Schofield was the one bright spot with 9 points and 11 rebounds.

But collectively, the unit shot 4-for-18 from the field. Grant Williams, who has been a star for the Vols all year, only had six points and also had four fouls. In his final college game, Lew Evans had no points and fouled out. Meanwhile, Kyle Alexander had only 2 points. If you want to point to a huge reason the Vols lost, this is one of the best things you can look at.

5. This team was inconsistent until the end.

All year long, this was far and away the most inconsistent basketball team in school history. And they didn’t disappoint with their inconsistency on Thursday. This is the same Tennessee basketball team that came back to beat the Alabama Crimson Tide a week ago but also lost to the LSU Tigers.

In this game, the shocker was that they stayed close the entire game and neither team went really on a crazy run. That’s different from what the Vols have done the rest of this year, though, so it’s another form of inconsistency. And that inconsistency is why they finished right at .500.