March Madness: 5 things we learned about Vols after the first weekend
1. Horrible start to the second half of games continues.
Although the Tennessee Vols will never panic, they will take their foot of the pedal way too soon. That’s been an ongoing issue throughout the season, and it was once again one in the first two games of March Madness.
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This team has been horrible all year coming out in the second half. It is the reason for their two losses to the Auburn Tigers that cost them the SEC regular season and tournament championships. They lost to Auburn in the regular season because of it and allowed Auburn to break the game open in the tournament.
It also cost them against the Kentucky Wildcats in their one loss to them, as they were down by 6 at halftime and allowed Kentucky to go up by 24 about 10 minutes into the second half. Oh, and it nearly cost them against the Alabama Crimson Tide and on the road against the Vanderbilt Commodores.
We saw all of that coming into the NCAA Tournament. But the Vols did not alleviate this concern. They blew a 25-point lead to the Iowa Hawkeyes because of a terrible start to the second half, and they allowed the Colgate Raiders to actually come back and take a lead on them.
Although the Purdue Boilermakers are not the type of team to get as red-hot offensively, they still can hit the three-ball. So the same thing could happen again if this team isn’t careful, and it means they can’t relax with any lead.
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If the Vols had the same intensity to open the second half as they do the rest of games, they would have at least won the SEC regular season title and coasted through the first two games of March Madness. Maybe this is the wake-up call they need, though, as they get set to face another Big Ten team in hopes of making the Elite Eight.