Tennessee destroys Wright State: 3 takeaways from Vols March Madness opening win

The Tennessee Volunteers opened March Madness 2018 by destroying the Wright State Raiders 73-47. Here are three takeaways from their NCAA Tournament win.

Any fear of a letdown to tip off March Madness after Sunday’s loss to the Kentucky Wildcats was squashed early. Tennessee basketball obliterated the Wright State Raiders in their first NCAA Tournament game to advance to the next round.

No. 3 seed Tennessee will face the winner of the Miami Hurricanes and Loyola (Chicago). With the win, they improved to 26-8 on the year, while Wright State finished its season with a 25-10 record.

The Raiders were actually competitive early on. They scored first with a pair of free throws from Parker Ernsthausen and then held the Vols without a point for the first three minutes of the game. In fact, at the first timeout, they were up 4-3.

But a Jordan Bowden layup gave Tennessee the lead for good. The Vols got on a roll after that and took a 34-23 lead into halftime. They continued their dominance into the second half for a very impressive win. Here are three takeaways from Tennessee’ victory in their opening round of March Madness.

1. Defense, defense and more defense!

This was a story of the Tennessee Vols heading into March Madness. Their offense comes and goes, but the defense is always good. That’s exactly what happened in this game. Tennessee basketball couldn’t score early in an offensive drought, but their defense remained dominant. Then, when they finally got on a run, their defense was still dominant.

The result? Tennessee held Wright State to 47 points. They were 31.7 percent from the field and 18 percent from three. The Raiders, to be fair, have been a highly inconsistent offensive team all year. This is one of the games they were just off. Combine that with the Vols’ elite defense, and this is the result you get.

2. The usual suspects did the scoring.

As we mentioned before March Madness began, Tennessee needed Admiral Schofield to stretch the floor with his diverse game, Grant Williams to dominate under the basket and one of the combo guards to step up, most likely Lamonte Turner. Those were the three Vols who achieved postseason recognition after all.

Well, in this game, it was those three scoring double-figures. Williams played big going 6-of-10 from the field with 14 points. Schofield had 15 points with two three-pointers, and Turner came off the bench to add 19 points, mostly thanks to going 9-of-10 from the free throw line and nailing two three-pointers. Those three alone had more points than the Raiders.

3. Tennessee was just too big.

We noted before the tournament that Wright State can play down low thanks to 6’9″ freshman Loudon Love. But the Vols managed to dominate the paint anyway, and that’s why they had such an easy time scoring the blowout.

Williams and Schofield did what they do, but Kyle Alexander also added six points. John Fulkerson, Derrick Walker and Yves Pons all also added valuable minutes off the bench. And Tennessee overall out-rebounded Wright State 44-32. There was Schofield’s double-double, but Fulkerson added seven rebounds off the bench, and Williams had nine rebounds. Meanwhile, Schofield and Alexander both had two blocks each. Simply put, Tennessee was too good all the way around to lose this game.