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Tennessee basketball: Five best things about Vols’ dominant win vs. Kentucky

By Caleb Calhoun

Tennessee guard Josiah-Jordan James (30) with a dunk during the NCAA college basketball game between the Kentucky Wildcats and Tennessee Volunteers in Knoxville, Tenn. on Tuesday, February 15, 2022.Px Uthoops Kentucky
Tennessee guard Josiah-Jordan James (30) with a dunk during the NCAA college basketball game between the Kentucky Wildcats and Tennessee Volunteers in Knoxville, Tenn. on Tuesday, February 15, 2022.Px Uthoops Kentucky /
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Tennessee guard Santiago Vescovi (25) tries to score while guarded by Kentucky guard Kellan Grady (31) during the NCAA college basketball game between the Kentucky Wildcats and Tennessee Volunteers in Knoxville, Tenn. on Tuesday, February 15, 2022.Px Uthoops Kentucky
Tennessee guard Santiago Vescovi (25) tries to score while guarded by Kentucky guard Kellan Grady (31) during the NCAA college basketball game between the Kentucky Wildcats and Tennessee Volunteers in Knoxville, Tenn. on Tuesday, February 15, 2022.Px Uthoops Kentucky /

It couldn’t have been a better atmosphere for Tennessee basketball. The Vols beat the Kentucky Wildcats 76-63 in front of a sellout crowd and a national television audience. For the first time since 2019, fans can feel a sense of excitement about the men’s basketball program and the endless potential of its team.

Very few regular season games in college basketball carry that type of excitement, and this game confirmed it after cautious optimism the past few weeks. Thanks to what happened in this matchup Rick Barnes is now once again the biggest star on Rocky Top.

Amidst an eight-game SEC winning streak and eight wins in nine games, lots of the concerns surrounding Tennessee basketball have been mitigated. There are many aspects of Tuesday night that helped to mitigate those aspects. In this post, we’re going to break those down. These are the five best things about UT’s Tuesday night win.

5. Revenge

Getting revenge is always fun, and the Vols needed it in this one. Their last SEC loss was back in mid-January, and it just happened to come on the road to the Kentucky Wildcats 107-79. In that game, they had 20 turnovers and allowed Kentucky to shoot over 61 percent from three. That mitigated what actually wasn’t a bad offensive performance.

After that loss, Barnes’ team was 2-3 in the SEC and barely clinging to a top 25 ranking. They’ve been climbing ever since, waiting for this rematch with UK returning to Knoxville. Once they did, Rocky Top returned the favor. This time they were the aggressor, and it worked out.

Kentucky was the one to commit 20 turnovers, and Tennessee basketball’s defense pulled a 180. Maybe it was the nature of playing in front of their home crowd, where the Vols are undefeated this year, but Tuesday night proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are a completely different team from the one that lost to Kentucky earlier.

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