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Ranking Tennessee Vols sports worst affected by coronavirus ending season

By Caleb Calhoun

KNOXVILLE, TN - FEBRUARY 2: Cheerleaders of the Tennessee Volunteers pregame against the Kentucky Wildcats in a game at Thompson-Boling Arena on February 2, 2016 in Knoxville, Tennessee. (Photo by Patrick Murphy-Racey/Getty Images)
KNOXVILLE, TN - FEBRUARY 2: Cheerleaders of the Tennessee Volunteers pregame against the Kentucky Wildcats in a game at Thompson-Boling Arena on February 2, 2016 in Knoxville, Tennessee. (Photo by Patrick Murphy-Racey/Getty Images) /
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Photo by Donald Page/Getty Images
Photo by Donald Page/Getty Images /

13. Men’s Basketball

Similar to the Tennessee Lady Vols, the Tennessee Vols men’s basketball program was likely not going to make the NCAA Tournament either. Despite a top 15 strength of schedule, they had lost by over 20 at home to the Auburn Tigers in their final game of the regular season, and they entered the postseason 17-14 and 9-9 in the SEC.

However, Rick Barnes’ program still lost a bit more than the Lady Vols. That’s because they still had an SEC Tournament to play, and their first game was set for Thursday at noon against the Alabama Crimson Tide. The tournament was canceled just an hour before tipoff, and a few hours later was when the NCAA decided to shut everything down.

UT was better than Alabama, and they would face the Kentucky Wildcats on Friday if they won. With the series being in Nashville, that would give them a great chance at a quality win, as they had just beaten UK on the road the previous week. As a result, the Vols had a great chance to make it to Saturday in the SEC Tournament.

Doing that would have given the program another quality win, boosted their schedule strength even further, and put them in position for one of the final at-large spots for the NCAA Tournament. And none of this was a long shot. So while they weren’t a great team this year, they definitely had something to play for, and the cancellation hurt them. That puts this sport at No. 13 on the list.

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