Less than two minutes into Saturday’s top 20 matchup between Tennessee Basketball and the Illinois Fighting Illini at Thompson-Boling Arena in Knoxville, Tenn., the Vols ledt 4-2. Dalton Knecht drove to the hoop, looking for his second field goal of the day. The ball rolled off the rim.
Right there to clean it up was Jonas Aidoo. After missing the initial put-back, Aidoo got his own rebound and put it in. About two minutes later, Knecht found Aidoo under the basket. He took the ball and slammed it home, giving the Vols an 11-8 lead at the time and answering a call.
Despite a career night against the George Mason Patriots earlier in the week in which he had 17 points and eight rebounds, Aidoo hadn’t proven he could be the necessary offensive force under the rim, as most of his buckets were fadeaways or three-pointers. This has been the missing component for Tennessee Basketball.
Well, it was a different story Saturday. Against one of the best defensive teams in the nation, Aidoo had 14 points, two blocks, seven rebounds, an assist and a steal to go along with 6-of 12 shooting, helping UT beat Illinois 86-79. He scored 10 of those 14 inside the circle underneath the basket, and four were off offensive rebounds.
This is the way Aidoo needed to score. He did it against a team with length as well, one starting a 6’10” player, and a team that has great interior defense. In addition to its size, Illinois is first in opponent two-point percentage at 39.4 and third in opponent effective field goal percentage at 41.
Meanwhile, they are seventh in rebounds per game with 45, No. 24 in rebounding percentage at 55.4, No. 19 in rebounding margin per game at +10. Simply put, everything about them suggests a team that is great on the interior and great on defense, so this was a true challenge for Aidoo, and he answered the bell.
One concern may be that he was 2-of-4 from the free throw line, but one of those missed free throws was right after he fell hard to the ground on an alley-oop in what would have been two more points under the circle. All of his field goals were scored in the paint.
The Vols have elite three-point shooters, they have a go-to scorer in Knecht, and as a Rick Barnes-led team, they have the defense. Add in the veteran experience of Santiago Vescovi and Josiah-Jordan James and the ability to play in transition with Zakai Zeigler, and when healthy, they have almost everything.
However, in March, when they inevitably run into a team red-hot shooting the ball, the question wasn’t if they would have the three-point shooters to handle that. It was whether or not they would have the interior offensive presence to take pressure off those shooters in case they weren’t having one of those red-hot games.
To be able to hang with such a team, they need Aidoo and Tobe Awaka to step up down low. Since Aidoo is taller and more athletic, it would be a much bigger help if he could do so. Awaka showed he could with 11 points the other night down low, but Aidoo can stretch the floor a bit more. He finally added the underneath element to his game.
Detractors will point out the Vols actually showed they don’t have the necessary shooting outside, as they were only 6-of-18 from three despite Aidoo taking that pressure off of them. However, opponents typically only shoot 30 percent from three against Illinois, so the Vols were actually better than average.
Also, Illinois sold out a lot more to stop the three-point shooting because they didn’t trust Aidoo, so those shots were a lot more contested. This allowed Knecht to attack the basket, which is another huge asset Rocky Top didn’t have last year, and it’s why he was able to score 21 points.
Knecht wasn’t the only one. Zeigler attacked a lot as well, which is why he had 11 points, hitting all six of his free throw attempts. James and Vescovi each had 12 points, and Vescovi and Knecht were at least efficient from outside, each going 2-of-5. Jahmai Mashack was able to dominate in the paint too and score nine points.
Against the No. 20 ranked team in the nation, Tennessee Basketball was able to prove it’s a major scoring threat INSIDE the paint. Because of that, in the future, teams will have to lay off their three-point defense a bit. Now we see if the Vols truly do have the arsenal of shooters Barnes went after in the offseason.
