Tennessee Lady Vols coach Holly Warlick miserably failed another big test

With the Tennessee Lady Vols’ loss to the South Carolina Gamecocks, women’s basketball Volunteers’ head coach Holly Warlick failed another big test.

It was a day that made for Holly Warlick to show off her coaching abilities. Amidst all the criticism she had faced, her Tennessee Lady Vols had the perfect opponent to show they were coming together and turning a corner.

The South Carolina Gamecocks were heading to town. At 17-9 and 6-7 in the SEC, UT did lose on Thursday to the Texas A&M Aggies. But last week, they had beaten the Missouri Tigers on the road and had still won five of seven overall. They were coming together.

Meanwhile, South Carolina came in as the No. 13 ranked team with a 19-7 record and 11-2 SEC record. They were coming of a loss to the Kentucky Wildcats and Tennessee’s final chance at a quality win for this regular season, which the Lady Vols have spent in uncharted waters as a bubble team.

What’s more, with morale down after the Kentucky loss, South Carolina entered the game without Te’a Cooper. One of its leading scorers, Cooper transferred away from Tennessee and Warlick, something that always should have seemed like an indictment against her. But here, with Cooper out, the Gamecocks coming off a loss and the game in Knoxville, UT had the chance to make a statement.

Instead, they fell flat. Warlick’s team forgot how to play defense. They fell behind 27-11 in the first quarter and by the middle of the second quarter were down by 20. This team did not show up to play in an environment made for it, and they were out of it within minutes.

The Tennessee Lady Vols did mount a second half comeback to get it to within single digits, but it was nowhere enough, and they still lost by 15 points, 82-67. coming out in a game so flat like that with everything on the line was an embarrassment. And at this point, that blame has to fall squarely on Warlick.

This is not early in the season. And she may have a young team, but her key players are all returners from last year’s team. With this being her seventh year on the job, these are clearly her players as well.

But under her leadership, the Tennessee Lady Vols went to sleep to tip off a game in which everything was on the line. There is absolutely no excuse for what happened in this outing Sunday afternoon. Warlick’s team didn’t just lose. They didn’t even compete in a game tailor-made for them to score a big win.

Now, UT is going to have to make a run in the SEC Tournament to make the NCAA Tournament. Have they ever needed a big win this late to make the Big Dance? It doesn’t seem so, and that’s an embarrassment given the talent this team is supposed to have.

We all know that Warlick has been failing numerous tests since she took over for a legend. But it was clear she deserved a break. After all, she was following a legend, there were numerous internal issues that set the program back when she took over, and she hasn’t gotten all the support that she needs.

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However, none of that excuses what happened on the court Sunday. She was already in hot water with this team being on the NCAA Tournament bubble to begin with. But losing the way they did on Sunday was just another failure in a series of failures.

Pat Summitt’s players would never be in a position to not go to the NCAA Tournament. But if they were, and there was a game like this with everything on the line, you can bet that they would have done whatever it took to win. Pure fear of Summitt’s would’ve driven them to perform at the highest level.

Did anybody see any fear of Warlick in the first quarter of this game? Of course not. She doesn’t have to be Summitt, but it was more than fair for fans to expect her to strike a bit of fear into her players. And she did none of that.

The performance was reminiscent of the collapse the men’s basketball team suffered in 2001 under Jerry Green. Remember when they got to No. 4 in January and then fell apart in February, climaxed by three straight home losses in which they just forgot to play defense early? This team forgot to play defense early. And that was the difference.

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It wasn’t that the shots weren’t falling. Heck, it wasn’t even that the Gamecocks were hitting their shots. The Tennessee Lady Vols just weren’t playing defense, which signaled a complete lack of motivation. Such a mentality falls back on the head coach, and amidst all the tests she has failed so hard, this may be Warlick’s biggest failure yet.