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Tennessee Lady Vols: Three takeaways from 60-45 loss at UConn

By Caleb Calhoun

ATLANTA, GA - MARCH 14: A general view of megaphones for the Tennessee Volunteers cheerleaders against the South Carolina Gamecocks during the quarterfinals of the SEC Men's Basketball Tournament at Georgia Dome on March 14, 2014 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)
ATLANTA, GA - MARCH 14: A general view of megaphones for the Tennessee Volunteers cheerleaders against the South Carolina Gamecocks during the quarterfinals of the SEC Men's Basketball Tournament at Georgia Dome on March 14, 2014 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images) /
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In their first meeting since 2007, the Tennessee Lady Vols fell to the UConn Huskies. Here are three takeaways from the women’s basketball Volunteers’ loss.

It was the first time they met since 2007, and the Tennessee Lady Vols would like to forget what happened in the second half. Despite building an eight-point lead at one point in the second quarter and going into halftime up 31-28, Kellie Harper’s No. 23 ranked team fell to the No. 3 ranked UConn Huskies 60-45.

With the win, UConn improved to 17-1 overall. This was actually their first win over Rocky Top since the 2004 national championship game in Diana Taurasi’s senior year, and they extended their lead in the series to 14-9.

UT, meanwhile, fell to 15-4 and 5-3 away from home. They will resume SEC play by playing host to the LSU Tigers, who just beat the Kentucky Wildcats, on Sunday. Here are three things we learned from the Tennessee Lady Vols’ loss.

1. Too many turnovers finally proved costly.

We’ve been criticizing this aspect of the team all year. It made sense with their youth and the fact that they had to replace Zaay Green due to a season-ending injury. But that doesn’t make it any prettier. In fact, it was hideous.

The Lady Vols had 26 turnovers on the night. It really started when, up 26-18, Geno Auriemma turned on a press. They struggled to score the rest of the way as he mixed up his defense. However, may turnovers were still unforced. Jordan Horston led the way with six, but Jazmine Massengill and Kasiyahna Kushkituah each had four while Lou Brown had three.

2. Inside game was an embarrassment.

If you watched what happened during the game, you wouldn’t realize that the Tennessee Lady Vols have the tallest team in program history. They got destroyed inside by the UConn Huskies. We already mentioned Kasiyahna Kushkituah and Lou Brown combining for seven turnovers. Well, Tamari Key made things worse by getting in foul trouble and then fouling out.

UConn, not the Lady Vols, had 17 offensive rebounds despite only going seven-deep, and they outrebounded UT overall 47-45 despite having 13 more missed shots. That should not happen with a team that is the Lady Vols’ size, and they’ve got to be more aggressive down low.

3. Defense wasn’t all that bad.

They got back in transition, and they were solid on the half-court front. UT could have allowed UConn to score lots more points considering the fact that they committed 26 turnovers and the Huskies were dialing up a press for part of the game.

However, the Huskies were held to 23-of-73 from the field, and they were four-of-18 from the three-point line. They only committed 11 turnovers, but UT was contesting every shot. It was just the rebounding that killed them. But there are some positives on this front.