Tennessee basketball pulls away from USC Upstate 80-60: Three takeaways

The Tennessee basketball Volunteers beat the Spartans 80-60.

A sloppy, sluggish performance ended with Tennessee basketball remaining undefeated on the year just before a week off to enjoy the Christmas holidays. UT beat the University of South Carolina Upstate Spartans 80-60 in Knoxville, Tenn. at Thompson-Boling Arena.

Rocky Top struggled to put away USC Upstate, though. While the Spartans’ only lead was 7-6 early on, they never let the Vols’ lead go over 10 points in the first half and trailed by only seven at halftime. UT only led 51-43 with under 11 minutes to go in the game. However, they methodically dominated the rest of the way to pull away for a 20-point win.

With the win, Tennessee basketball moves to 6-0 and will next take the court on Dec. 30 at the Missouri Tigers for its first road game and first SEC game. USC Upstate falls to 0-8 on the year. Here are three things we learned from the Vols’ win.

1. Three-point disparity helped make this ugly.

This is the biggest reason for nobody to panic over this game being close for a while. The Spartans just had one of those red-hot shooting nights in which everything they threw up went in from beyond the arc. They went 9-of-18 from beyond the arc despite shooting 37 percent coming into the game, and UT went 5-of-16 despite also shooting 37 percent from there.

That alone is why the Vols could only muster 80 points against a defense that allows 86 points a game. However, they didn’t allow USC Upstate to do anything else offensively, as the Spartans were an abysmal 15-of-35 on two-pointers and had 12 assists to 15 turnovers.

2. Half-court scoring was still efficient.

Even without the elite three-point shooting, Tennessee basketball faced another test having to score out of its half-court sets, something that was a struggle early in the year. That’s because the Spartans ran a zone, something UT has had trouble breaking. Well, despite not putting on an offensive clinic, the Vols were able to break that zone in this game.

They shot 56 percent from the field despite struggling outside, something that should favor a zone, and they had 21 assists to 12 turnovers. That ball movement was the story. Santiago Vescovi had eight assists, Josiah-Jordan James had five and Jaden Springer had three off the bench. In terms of scoring, Victor Bailey Jr. had 18, John Fulkerson had 10 and while James had 11.

3. Big plays defensively remain the story.

It’s not just that the Vols continue to dominate on rebounds, and they did do that. UT outrebounded the Spartans 32-18 and got eight from James and six from Fulkerson. However, they do so many other things as well.

UT came away with nine steals and seven blocks. James again was all over this with three steals and a block. Yves Pons had a steal and two blocks. Bailey had two steals and a block. Springer became the defensive specialist freshman in this one with two blocks off the bench. Simply put, Tennessee basketball found ways to make plays despite a bit of a three-point difference.