Tennessee Basketball: What caused the Vols’ 55-62 loss vs FAU

Tennessee basketball couldn’t get it done against the FAU Owls and failed to make it past the Sweet Sixteen for the 8th time in 9 appearances.

The Vols started the game off in dominating fashion and playing their type of basketball. They had a five-point lead at halftime, and it seemed like the game was theirs. However, something happened at halftime, and the Vols completely fell apart In the second half, inevitably leading to the loss against a far inferior opponent.

The Tennessee Basketball Second-Half Meltdown

The Volunteers should’ve been up by ten or more at halftime. It felt like this game was in the Vols’ hands, and they just gave it to FAU. They let FAU go on an 18-2 run in the second half. I don’t understand how the best defense in the nation lets a pretty average FAU team do that and score 40 points in the second half of the game.

Here’s what senior Santiago Vescovi said about the second half in the post-game press conference, according to On3 Sports:

"“First of all, they definitely made shots. They made the shots they had to make. Like Coach said, they got big offensive rebounds. They ran a couple actions that were really good basketball actions. They knock them down. I think the biggest thing was offensive rebounding for them.”"

Furthermore, Here’s what head coach Rick Barnes also had to say:

"“Well, I thought, one, in the first half, they had some shots; we dodged that. But when they started scoring, our offense wasn’t very good. We gave up too many drives. And then along with that, offensive rebounds where we let them get downhill, a couple situations where those — we did a better job in the second half staying down on shot fakes.Early in the first half that’s how we were getting into so much rotation because we were leaving our feet, went under a few ball screens. But I thought offensively we didn’t — we needed to continue to put pressure on them at the rim, whether it was throwing it inside or whether it was driving the ball, and we didn’t do enough of that.When we got the ball there, we needed to finish more to continue to keep pressure on them to where they had to guard us. Then they got some separation, they got relaxed, and I mean, they’re a really good shooting team. They shoot it. The offensive rebounds were — those were big. We normally don’t do that, but we did today.”"

A common theme from both Vescovi and Barnes is the crucial factor of letting them get second chance opportunities. The Vols got outrebounded, outmuscled, and couldn’t crash the boards in the second half. It was only a matter of time until the Owls started hitting their shots, and in the second half, they did just that.

It’s a shame that the Volunteers lost, but if we look back on the season, it was one hell of a run. Rick Barnes is a fantastic coach, and making it to the sweet 16 with all of the injuries that the Vols faced is a win in my book.