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Tennessee Lady Vols five most painful losses of 2019-2020 season

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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Despite no bad losses, the 2019-20 Tennessee Lady Vols let some get away. Here are the five worst for the women’s basketball Volunteers this past year.

Kellie Harper’s first team on Rocky Top had a lot to deal with. Not only were the Tennessee Lady Vols breaking her in as a new head coach, but they were also dealing with the transfer of their best player from last year, Evina Westbrook, and the loss of two other starters, Meme Jackson and Cheridene Green. Then Zaay Green suffered a season-ending injury two games into the year.

As a result, this team had to rely on four new starters all season, a new system, and the loss of five rotational players overall when you count the departure of Mimi Collins. Taking all that into account, Harper was always going to have a bit of a rough time.

What came with that, though, was the Tennessee Lady Vols consistently coming up short against quality competition. Their 21-10 record, which included two games in the SEC Tournament, was notable for its failure to beat elite teams and its dominance against inferior teams.

Rocky Top went 1-10 against top 50 teams in the RPI and 20-0 against teams outside of the top 50. Hey, at least they ran the table. But it put them on the bubble of the NCAA Tournament and may have cost them had the selection actually taken place.

Part of that, though, was due to a few painful losses. This team certainly had its opportunities to build on its one quality win, but it consistently came up short. In this post, we’re going to take a look at those games the Lady Vols would like back.

Our criteria for worst losses involve how heartbreaking they were and how embarrassing they were. Since this team had no embarrassing losses in terms of quality competition and was not historically blown out by anybody, all of these losses rank solely by heartbreak.

The good news for this team is all the key players are back next year with Green also expected to return to full health. So they should be able to turn a few more of these games into wins. Let’s analyze which games we’re talking about. These are the Tennessee Lady Vols’ five most painful losses of the 2019-2020 season.