Tennessee basketball opened up play at the SEC Tournament by knocking off Texas 83-72 on Friday afternoon in Nashville.
Following the game, Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes discussed Chaz Lanier’s hot-start, facing Auburn in a rematch on Friday and much more. Here’s everything Barnes said.
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Opening statement
“First, utmost respect for the University of Texas and Rodney and his staff. I think this was the fifth or sixth game where they had their whole team intact trying to play. They came in here in a very tough situation. To me there’s no doubt there’s an NCAA team, the fact that he came in here and got ’em playing the way they were.
For us, we were obviously very concerned about the game because the staffs know each other so well. Again, great respect for the University of Texas and that basketball program.
Proud of our guys. We knew it was going to be tough early. Jahmai Mashack was a guy that I thought defensively set a great tone for us trying to guard Tre Johnson. He’s a terrific player. That and early Chaz got going. But overall good team win for us. It was hard-fought.”
On if he expects a similar game to the first matchup against Auburn
“I don’t know. Still takes a bit of time to wind down from this one.
Great respect for Bruce. Again, you go through this season, only lose two games in this league, the way it’s played out from start to finish with non-league, what the conference play was like. It will just take a gigantic effort with everybody, like Zakai said, being locked in. They’ve got a 10-deep team, old team, experienced team, a team that’s been here and won it.
They have Player of the Year in Johni Broome. They have a lot of pieces. We’ll have to be on top of our game.”
On if he dislikes facing Rodney Terry
“They’re not. They’re really not. I can tell you through the years we’ve tried not to ever schedule the guys that we have connection with, like with Rodney and Frank and Rob Lanier, Mike Schwartz now, Kim English.
It’s tough, because you know what, we won a lot of games at Texas. Those guys were a huge, huge part of it. I look at them this year. I mean, coming into a new league, had to be an adjustment for them and Oklahoma. The fact that both of those teams at the end of the year playing high-level basketball. I know Rodney this year struggled with some injuries, trying to work in a super talent like he has in Tre Johnson is tough.
Both games were hard-fought games. Really a couple possessions here or there. But yes, it’s always hard to play against really you feel like you’re playing against your family and it’s tough.”
On how Chaz Lanier has handled this season, having a major role
“Again, great. Again, we didn’t talk about him replacing Dalton. We talked about what we needed from him. The utmost respect for Chaz because he had a chance to go other places, probably do a little bit better NIL-wise. He decided he wants to stay home. He wanted to play in front of — be in his home state.
He’s very unselfish, very unselfish player. I will say this to you. The difference in the two would be I never had to Dell Dalton to shoot. I beg Chaz to shoot sometimes because he’s so conscientious of wanting to be a part of it.
I think what’s helped him as much as any is we kind of had another guy to step into the role is Jordan Gainey. Both those guys made it tough, we get those guys on the flanks out there. Pretty hard to guard.
Defensively Chaz has really done a good job buying in on that end. For a guy that, again, one year here, he’s very confident in who he is, but he’s a very, very unselfish basketball player. Sometimes to a fault.
I don’t think any point in time I’ve compared him to Dalton when we’re talking one on one. I’m always comparing those guys to where they want to get at the highest level.
Again, he’s just been a great fit for us. He came in like Dalton with the idea that he wanted to be part of a winning game, winning team and wanted to get to the NCAA tournament. He’s gotten better in the last two weeks. I thought he did a great job today moving without the ball. He’s learned how to set his man up better. He spent a lot of time the last two and a half, three weeks, did it earlier, but even more so learning to adjust in ways being guarded, grabbed and stuff.
He’s worked hard. Learned how to make two, three, four cuts, keep himself moving, harder to guard. When he’s open, he’s got to shoot it. When he’s hitting it, it just lights a fire I think under everybody.”
On if Texas should make the NCAA Tournament
“Well, I’ll answer the second part first. There’s no doubt Texas is an NCAA team. There’s so many teams in our league that would win conferences. There’s no doubt in my mind that they did enough coming in. They have. Being on the bubble, whatever people want to talk about. I think they’ve done more than enough. I think we should have 14 teams in the NCAA tournament is what I think. What’s the first part of the question?”
On if he was worried about having too much time off before this game, coming out slow
“Both. We’ll look back and take some things from the game obviously. What’s ironic, 10 years ago during this tournament, Tennessee and Auburn were in the playing-in game. Since that 10 years, I would think that we know each other pretty well (smiling). Obviously, both teams have grown.
But we’ll look back obviously at our last game with them. Seems like forever ago. I do think they’re better. I think we’re better. We have the utmost respect for them and I think they do for us.”
On if Chaz Lanier eased any concerns about the start of postseason play
“It is. We started talking about it a couple weeks ago. We go into the South Carolina game and we’re approaching this like the first round of the NCAA tournament. I want to get it on their mindset now. This is an NCAA tournament-type game.
We talk about it. I want them to feel a little bit of what everybody feels in March. I thought Chaz was really focused in practice. Again, we didn’t do a lot. We’d do our routine, but we were like yesterday on the court for 45 minutes. Monday we did very little. Tuesday off. Wednesday we practiced hour and 15 hard. We always practice hard.
I thought Chaz’ focus the whole week has been good. Again, when you talk about Zakai, he mentioned it, he and Shaq and Jordan last year, we walked in here and we were awful. Yesterday they gathered up after we had practice, they reminded those guys that we’re not going to come out and play like that. We got out-toughed a year ago. You heard Zakai say. If we lose, it’s not going to be because we didn’t put the effort in, because we didn’t last year.
We were lucky that we were able to have an NCAA tournament afterwards. I think winning is a habit and I think losing is a habit. The mindset is something, the routine that we’re in, we try to stay in it, but we try to talk about everything we know they’re hearing out there anyway.
Jahmai was awesome today. He was the MVP in the game. When you have to guard one of the best players in the country, if I look at it, I think he even outscored him, which is unusual. We don’t count on him to do a lot of that. He’s getting fouled early, making his free throws. He was outstanding in every way today. I thought it set a great tone for us.”
