Tigers Vols Letdown

"I don't know if we're the best team in the country...but i do know we're 40 minutes away from being the #1 team in the country," Bruce Pearl shouted in the visiting locker room, trying to fire up his Volunteers.

Well Bruce, you're definitely not the best team in the country. To be honest, I don't even know how you won tonight.

There was an amazing amount of hype for a game with so little substance. Tennessee shot 24-64 (37.5%) and 6-19 from 3 (31.5%). Memphis was 23-56 (41%) in FGs and 8-27 from the three point line (29.6%). All of Memphis' 3s came in the first half. The shot charts look retarded - especially Tennessee's:

Tennessee
Memphis

The final score was 66-62, not on account of good defense, but instead because of horrible shooting. Tennessee's streetball against Memphis'...something else. The gameplan for both teams must have been to shoot 3 after 3, miss most of them, and then drive the lane, making sure to miss most of your opportunities inside. No defense needed...because the opposing offense can't score anyway.

With less than a minute left, Memphis passes up 2 open shots, only to miss the layup to take the lead. Dozier and Dorsey, both Memphis players, then drag themselves to the floor. Tennessee ball. It isn't that they lost composure and missed a critical shot...that's just how they played all game. Antonio Anderson then jacks up a horrible shot, way to the left of the rim, which shot back off of the backboard. J.P. Prince made the FTs he had to, even if his first shot hit every part of the rim twice, before falling through. The game almost put me to sleep, but I kept watching because it was in HD.

If that was really #1 against #2, Kansas, Duke, UNC, UCLA, Texas, and all the other Top 25 teams must be thinking they have an even better shot in the tournament than they did before.

I wish they would have given Erin Andrews more face time.