There is no diminishing what Rick Barnes and the Vols have accomplished in 2018-19. Tennessee is in the midst of the greatest stretch of wins in program history, has casually dispatched with 19 out of 20 opponents, each of their primary contributors is evolving into a star before our very eyes and opponent coaches are openly calling Tennessee a team without weaknesses. Tennessee is now a legitimately fashionable and functional force in the game.
Did you ever dream you’d watch Tennessee battling Duke for relevance in Basketball? Neither did we.
But all those wins and all that sauce is only the beginning. In order to reach the ultimate goal, Tennessee has to navigate three final tests. And the first one begins Saturday night in Lexington.
Tennessee has playfully thrashed their way through the Baby Gap section of the top-heavy SEC. but in the next two weeks, they’ll square off on the road against a shockingly stout LSU, and (much more importantly) they square-off twice with Kentucky Wildcats.
What’s the prize for this stretch: A chance to repeat as SEC regular season champions, this time outright.
What’s the risk: Losing the streak and all this momentum.
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UT has a chance to make its case for a top-overall seed in the NCAA tournament with another solid win against Kentucky on Saturday, putting them in the catbird seat for a historically deep run, though a loss doesn’t necessarily rule the Vols out of that top spot.
To this point, Tennessee has shown virtually no faults and has shown that it is a team which is terrifically hard to rattle. If it can carry that through these final 7 regular season games, it very well could win-out and make a very compelling case for being the best team in the program’s history.
The first chance for this team to make history comes Saturday, with an opportunity to hand the Kentucky Wildcats their first consecutive loss at home in the Calipari era. This would also mark the third win in the past four games against the Cats, as UT swept Kentucky in the regular season one year ago.
In order to do that, though, Tennessee needs to take one major step forward: it has to remember how to defend on the perimeter. Otherwise, Kentucky will shoot the lights out and run Tennessee out of the gym. If Tennessee can control the perimeter, and play its usual gritty game in the paint, the Vols could very well make this first bit of history and set a course for 26 wins.
The next test is the SEC Tournament. And then, of course, comes The Big Dance. But first thing’s first.
Here we go.
