Tennessee basketball’s Felix Okpara turned in a disappointing performance in the Vols’ 80-64 season-opening win over Gardner-Webb on Monday night at Thompson-Boling Arena at Food City Center.
The Ohio State transfer scored just two points while missing all three of his field goal attempts, the front end of the bonus twice and turning it over three times.
But the poor performance made more sense following the game when Rick Barnes noted that Okpara is dealing with an injury.
“Since I’ve known Felix, it’s probably the toughest day he has had,” Barnes said postgame. “Not to make excuses, but to tell the truth, he’s got a really pretty serious hip pointer, but he absolutely refuses to come out of practice and play in the game. I mean, he’s going to play.”
Despite the bad offensive performance, Okpara still did some good things on the court including grabbing nine rebounds. But the elite rim protector blocked just one shot and didn’t have the burst that he showed at Ohio State and this offseason.
Okpara had the best preseason of any of Tennessee’s incoming transfers and looked like a high-floor center who could realistically become an All-SEC selection by the end of the season.
“If you’ve ever dealt with a hip pointer you know what it’s like,” Barnes said. “And I can show you film in practice where he’s almost trying to protect it with his hands. But, again, from a production standpoint, since I’ve known him, this might be the worst that he’s had. But he’ll work at it and he’ll get better. I’m talking more offensively. Defensively, I thought he tried to do the things that we asked him to do.”
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It’s uncertain when Okpara suffered his injury but he performed well in the Vols’ exhibition loss against Indiana, battling Hoosiers’ star Oumar Ballo.
Tennessee is in a tricky spot in its front court in just the first week of the season. Backup center JP Estrella battled a foot injury for most of the offseason and isn’t all the way back to 100%. The sophomore center was a game time decision against Gardner-Webb with a separate ankle injury before eventually deciding to give it a go.
Estrella played 11 minutes, scoring four points and grabbing two rebounds. He also played in the exhibition game against Indiana as he’s done more-and-more in the last month.
That leaves sophomore Cade Phillips as the Vols’ only true option at the five-spot. At 6-foot-9, Phillips is more of a true four-man but has gotten an abundance of experience playing the five-spot this summer while Estrella was out.
“JP going down, the way our team works, you got to step up,” Phillips said. “Because that’s how our team is, you have to have your brother’s back. Being able to play the five really prepares you. You all see how physical Felix is. Being able to battle that every day and then you go back to the four and you’re playing guys that are six inches shorter and 40 pounds lighter, you feel like it is a cake walk almost.”
Tennessee is thin even at the four-spot where Hofstra transfer Darlinstone Dubar is out right now while dealing with a personal matter.
The challenge gets much harder for Tennessee basketball on Saturday when they travel to Louisville to face a much improved Cardinals team. Tipoff is at noon ET on the ACC Network.
