Rick Barnes reacts to the Vols’ staggering performance from the perimeter against the Wildcats
Knoxville, Tenn. – Tennessee’s Rick Barnes ‘disappointed’ in team’s effort following the 78-73 loss to the Kentucky Wildcats.
Breakdowns on defense for Tennessee led the Vols to play an offensive style that doesn’t fit their strengths: firing off three-pointers.
Tennessee’s 45 three-point attempts passed the previous season-high of 37 against UT Martin.
“We knew they were going to give us all the threes we wanted,” said Barnes.
Tennessee started the game 1-10 from the perimeter. The lone triple came from Igor Milicic Jr., who had his best game of the season with four three-pointers.
However, with the poor start on offense, Mark Pope’s Cats were simply going to give the Vols all the looks they wanted.
“That was by design, that’s what they were looking for,” said Barnes. “When obviously we weren’t making them they were going to back up even more, which I mean why not?”
The Vols putting themselves in a position to take 45 threes is not a model Barnes wants his team to follow, because he puts it simply on whether this roster can support that.
“No. Absolutely not,” said Barnes.
Instead, Barnes wants his team to get more inside looks but it’s increasingly difficult to pull off such a task when you don’t have any presence from three that opponents have to respect.
“I do think Cade (Phillips) and Felix (Okpara) can give us some of that, as we all know. They need to touch it some. We’ve talked about that enough, too,” said Barnes.
In SEC play, the Vols are average 31% from the three.
“Look at the numbers, and people are going to say, ‘Until they can make ’em, we’re going to give them all they want,” said Barnes.
On the other side, Kentucky was 50% from the field and perimeter. The Cats went 12-24 from three, but Barnes doesn’t believe that was the difference. Instead, it was their own inability to build consistency on offense.
“I don’t think they were the least bit concerned with us shooting the ball tonight,” said Barnes.”
For the Vols, Barnes said it’s about sticking to the game plan and playing more focused.
Barnes said, “We didn’t start the game executing, I can’t tell you the number of times we just didn’t execute what we said we wanted to do. That’s on me, obviously. I didn’t get the message to them, loud and clear. We’ll fix that.”
