Chaz Lanier kept up his red-hot shooting by scoring 23 points and going 5-of-12 from three. Jahmai Mashack and Jordan Gainey each dropped 10 points. Scoring isn’t why the Vols rebounded from a tough loss to beat a top 15 team in their return home, though.
It was their interior defense.
After getting wrecked on the inside against the Vanderbilt Commodores in their 76-75 loss last Saturday, which outweighed the fact that they shot well from three and played solid perimeter defense, UT returned home to beat the Mississippi State Bulldogs 68-56. It was a big performance against a team that bat them twice last year.
Tennessee, ranked No. 6 in the AP Poll and No. 7 in the Coaches Poll, still shot well enough from three and played good enough perimeter defense. However, the key for them was taking away Mississippi State’s inside game, which is a hallmark of Chris Jans’ team.
MSU, ranked No. 14 in both polls coming into the game, was averaging 82.5 points per game despite being out of the top 100 in three-pointers made per game and outside of the top 240 in three-point percentage. They are in the top 40 in two-pointers, though, so their scoring is inside.
In this game, though, they only hit nine two-pointers, less than half of what they usually convert, and they were 19-of-56 from the field. That allowed Tennessee to stay in control of this game even as MSU managed to make a run late in the contest.
Felix Okpara was at the heart of this interior production, coming away with 12 rebounds. Igor Milicic Jr. and Cade Phillips did their part too, but don’t forget about the work Zakai Zeigler did, forcing five steals on the night and continuing his aggression.
Holding MSU to 56 points while they shot above 30 percent from three and only had 11 turnovers came completely down to the interior defense, and Rick Barnes has to be proud of what his team was able to do there. Perhaps they are finally adjusting to life without what they expected it to be before J.P. Estrella’s season-ending injury.
With the win, Tennessee improves to 17-2 and 4-2 in the SEC and will visit the No. 1 ranked Auburn Tigers on Saturday. Mississippi State, meanwhile, falls to 15-4 and 3-3 in the SEC and will visit the South Carolina Gamecocks on Saturday.
