Game Thread: 2023 Women's NCAA Tournament...Round of 16: Lady Vols v Va. Tech...Sat @ 6:30 ESPN2

[travis929]

Definitely appeared dirty. It's hard to say if she really connected or if the player flopped.

The first angle actually made it look not as bad as I thought when they originally played the replay. Looks like Walker crashed into Soule unexpectedly and her arm inadvertently hit Soule's head. The shove-off after definitely looks intentional, though. Everyone online is calling it a punch though, which I don't really see - especially not to the face! Am I missing something?

Walker and Horston both said they left the game with busted lips. Classic case of Soule playing aggressively physical all game and then this play is what gets blasted all over the internet (not excusing Walker's intentional push-off at all).

 

[T_Vol376]

Definitely appeared dirty. It's hard to say if she really connected or if the player flopped.

Well… flop or not Walker put her hands on her.
Some are defending Walker saying the girl pushed her around all night. I don’t care - I find this unacceptable.

 

[travis929]

It is pretty clear that Kellie plays favorites. Everything about who we select to put on the court at any given time is a dog's breakfast.

Hollingshead matched up well and was able to give Kitley fits, but Puckett gets all of those minutes playing down low? I know Jill missed a couple but Sara's statline has been pretty much empty all year and she isn't really helping in any of the aspects which don't show up on the stat sheet either. I can see playing someone to get them out of a slump. But tournament time is not when you do that. You have to go with the hot hand and the better matchups.

Jillian was rushing shots and not finishing, even though she got some good looks (just like Tess). In the post-game presser, Kellie said they wanted to try going small with Sara to create better spacing offensively so that Va. Tech would stop crowding the paint - which is when we went on our run. I was surprised that Sara really held her own against Kitley. Kitley really didn't do that much damage in this game - it was the Amoore show.

 

[glv98]

Which reminds me, Kitley goes out and we need to cut the deficit so what do we do? We sit Horston, Jackson and Hollingshead at the same time. I will give Kellie credit for belatedly getting Darby and Striplin out and Jackson back in after we were down by ten

Yes! We screamed at that, but unfortunately it did no good.

 

[travis929]

One of the big things I've seen all season when we lose is we usually allow the other team to go on a run and do nothing to break their rhythm. The next step of this disaster happens frequently when we are struggling to score. This often follows where our hoop seems to have a lid on it preventing the ball to go in and we'fre settling for perimeter shots that are not falling.

Yeah, I'm not a McGuff fan, but he used his timeouts really well today against UConn. Any time UConn made a slight notion of making a comeback - even just back-to-back buckets - he called a timeout and usually they scored coming out of it.

 

[LUVMESUMVOL]

Tess will be great if somebody is teaching her moving without the ball. Creating her shoots. I remembered watching Zolman. Opponent get tired Chasing ger around like Cury.when she doesn't play well, we're done.

Zolman was more physically fit. Tess really needs to tone her body up and get quicker or else she will be non existent against more athletic teams

 

[turbovol]

Zoltan was more physically fit. Tess really needs to tone her body up and get quicker or else she will be non existent against more athletic teams

Zolman had many of the same issues as Darby....

 

[Rooster1]

As

sure play Horaton with 6 turnovers and who doula 3 point shooters. He bit would get aore

Drunk

 

[Ladyvolfan4life]

The team looked flat even during warm ups. I also found it odd that they used so much warm up time for locker room talk and court huddles. I watched the UConn game before ours and we looked the worst out of all the teams on defense, it was very obvious. We don’t sprint at all. Cuts are slow if we even make them. Guarding at the 3 is painful to watch. Tess trying to play defense is painful to watch. I want to know who the strength and conditioning coach is because they need to be fired.

 

[Volfaninfl2]

At least we have baseball till May.

You might want to take a look at our softball team, we’re ranked #2 in the country right now.

 

[AllVolinGA]

You might want to take a look at our softball team, we’re ranked #2 in the country right now.

Ah, the village idiots are calling for the torches and pitchforks after they lost today.

 

[Volfaninfl2]

Awful look for Walker and bad way to end her career.

Meanwhile the other Jordan can always reflect back on the (likely) last game of her Tennessee career and remember the selfish, boneheaded play that defined her career and cost her team a chance to play for the Final Four.

Next season we could very well see addition by subtraction...

Not trying to be funny, I recorded the game, which play are you talking about?

 

[Volfaninfl2]

Ah, the village idiots are calling foe the torches and pitchforks after they lost today.

Going to read about it now. Only 2nd loss of the season, still hate it, being against Bama, but we play them again tomorrow. Bet I can guess the village idiots, some of them are here.

 

[Volfaninfl2]

The first angle actually made it look not as bad as I thought when they originally played the replay. Looks like Walker crashed into Soule unexpectedly and her arm inadvertently hit Soule's head. The shove-off after definitely looks intentional, though. Everyone online is calling it a punch though, which I don't really see - especially not to the face! Am I missing something?

Walker and Horston both said they left the game with busted lips. Classic case of Soule playing aggressively physical all game and then this play is what gets blasted all over the internet (not excusing Walker's intentional push-off at all).

I recorded the game, and watched this several times. After the shove off with the right hand, it appears Walker’s left fist then struck her head, which knocked her down.

 

[Majors]

The team looked flat even during warm ups. I also found it odd that they used so much warm up time for locker room talk and court huddles. I watched the UConn game before ours and we looked the worst out of all the teams on defense, it was very obvious. We don’t sprint at all. Cuts are slow if we even make them. Guarding at the 3 is painful to watch. Tess trying to play defense is painful to watch. I want to know who the strength and conditioning coach is because they need to be fired.

Most of what you said you’re born with. Can’t coach hustles and can’t coach genetics. More who recruited and offered over strength coach getting what they are given.

 

[charleyhorse]

Jillian was rushing shots and not finishing, even though she got some good looks (just like Tess). In the post-game presser, Kellie said they wanted to try going small with Sara to create better spacing offensively so that Va. Tech would stop crowding the paint - which is when we went on our run. I was surprised that Sara really held her own against Kitley. Kitley really didn't do that much damage in this game - it was the Amoore show.

There’s plenty of spacing. Darby standing 30 fit out with her hands out for the ball. She never goes inside etc. when she is off there are 5 inside the paint defending.

 

[charleyhorse]

I recorded the game, and watched this several times. After the shove off with the right hand, it appears Walker’s left fist then struck her head, which knocked her down.[/QUOTEdribble queen. D2 material

 

[creekdipper]

Not sure how you can dismiss the culture KJH has built when it just delivered us another season of Rickea. Of course culture alone won't get it done, gotta win the actual big games, but it's definitely important.

You're not sure how Loyal D can dismiss anything Lady Vol, especially Kellie-related?

 

[creekdipper]

She wasn’t fully healthy

She scored 22 her last game out. What do you consider "fully healthy?" 50 points?

 

[Coach Jumper]

Kellie reverted back to her terrible habit of wanting to play everyone, instead of playing the 5 best position players and substituting only when neccesary. She did not do this in the LSU comeback win. It breaks my heart that she cannot or will not realize that you must go with your best players, by position, as much as possible.

this is what cost up this game IMO

 

[creekdipper]

Is this supposed to make us feel better? UConn had been to 17 straight Final Fours. We haven't been to ONE Final Four in 15/16 years.

I find this comnent to be unacceptable and bordering upon posting malpractice.

 

[Coach Jumper]

Single handle let the smallest player they have bet us.

remember this when we start talking down "under 6 ft players"

 

[MsSportsGuy]

For whatever reason, the LVs have allowed a single player to torch them from outside several times over the past decade or so with seemingly no idea how to stop them.

When the team came out flat and got down double digits I knew they wouldn't catch up. I give them credit for closing the gap but they never solved the Aamore riddle. A few opportunities to actually take control of the game resulted in turnovers or bad offense.

Harper is back next year of course. Exactly how the roster looks remains to be seen as I expect the portal will add but also remove some players, as is the case for most programs now.

It was a very disappointing season for UT but not a bad one, just a microcosm of where the program is right now. Still very good and will have far more wins than losses but will unlikely compete for a title or FF unless there is a talent upgrade and some increased coaching acumen.

 

[creekdipper]

Well, as Auriemma said about his own team during their loss, we picked the wrong time to let all our worst mistakes & weaknesses come back to haunt us.

Came out flat. Stood on offense. Missed multiple open threes. Unforced turnovers that killed momentum. Fundamental errors (dribbling off foot, passing to teammate not looking, fouling 3-point shooter, losing handle on ball, etc.). Missed layups & 2-footers. Digging a point-deficit hole. Substitutions not matching on-court situations. Loss of composure & frustration over officiating. Failfure to stop or slow down the hot opposing player.

In short, a microcosm of our early-season woes. A very winnable game in which we beat ourselves.

In the openi g rounds, it looked as though we were peaking at exactly the right time and had figured out everyone's roles and that both offense and defense had finally come around. Va Tech is a good, solid team, but (other than Amoore) did nothing special. If we had had one of our star players to show out the way Amoore did... or even limited her to 18 points...we would have won, even with our mistakes. But our inconsistency was eventually going to catch up with us. I dreaded seeing us face OSU's press again.

The good news is that we have a lot of tools to work with next year. We have a lot to fix, but we can do that if we will concentrate on improving fundamentals and installing a simpke, effective motion offense. We should have made the Eight (or Four) this year, which would shown great progress and attracted recruiting attention. And we never know how injuries may impact a season, so we have to make the most of opportunities. We also have to get our bench ready...we saw how Miles impacted our press with speed, and a game-ready Justine could have provided some badly-needed 3-point punch.

The coaching staff has got to figure out how to maximize the available talent and either bring in quicker, faster players who can also score or figure out how to minimize our weaknesses to the extent that those areas don't beat us.

Disappointing finish but the opportunities are there for next season.

 

[Majors]

this is what cost up this game IMO

Meanwhile VT plays 6 players and runs away with it