Game Thread: (7/9) Lady Vols 70 - Arkansas 63

In the article in the Arkansas newspaper:

If you click on the article link, then click on its link for more photos: In almost every photo showing a Razorback player taking a shot or making a drive, you will see two or three orange jerseys defending!

That brings up a bone for Kellie to pick at during film session. We had three orange jerseys underneath on a missed Ark FG attempt, and yet somehow a weak side guard was able to slip in between them to gather the ball, hit a layup, and draw a foul in the process (converted the ft to cut our lead to three late in game). No excuse for not boxing out; all three of our players were caught standing straight up gawking.
 
That brings up a bone for Kellie to pick at during film session. We had three orange jerseys underneath on a missed Ark FG attempt, and yet somehow a weak side guard was able to slip in between them to gather the ball, hit a layup, and draw a foul in the process (converted the ft to cut our lead to three late in game). No excuse for not boxing out; all three of our players were caught standing straight up gawking.

I remember that. I also remember thinking there will be some red faces (from embarrassment) in film session. :oops:

I’m grateful we don’t see that happening very often.
 
Coming straight on for you!
FCoksqSXoAAttzG
 
Yes! Not even the worst critic of Tennessee can take away the FACT that they have been consistently outstanding in this area, nor dispute that this is a particularly helpful area to be excelling in. It cannot be that nearly every single team Tennessee has played has simply “had an off night shooting.” The Lady Vols’ length and defense affects a lot of their shots, and even the open shots opponents sometimes get have been altered by their own wavering confidence — caused by our good defense.
I said during the off season that Tamari may not be the best player on the team, but she's their most important. The way she single handedly disrupts opposing team offenses with her size, length and shot blocking more than compensates for their spotty shooting and will keep Tennessee in most games. As long as she continues to do her thing, you can't count out Tennessee. There are very few SEC teams that have the right combination of interior/perimeter players to muscle through this defense. Outside of SC, LSU and UGA, I can't imagine any other SEC teams having enough size and firepower to seriously threaten Tennessee.
 
Final thoughts on the game not one of our best performances of the season. We can play a lot better defensively even if they only shot 30 percent and 20 from the three most of it was on them they had some really excellent open looks. Glad the Refs called 29 of the plus 50 fouls Arkansas committed at least calling that many gave us a chance to win. Arkansas shot 40 threes which I thought was poor judgement on their part as it turned out to be a large factor as to why they lost the game. Great to win when you don't play your best as a team defensively, but had some players really come through offensively. Dye had her best game 6 of 9 from the field and Green was 4 of 4 and hit 3 of 4 from the line. Key of course was a player they could not guard Arkansas got away with a lot of fouls and many of them while guarding Key and a few more guarding Horston. Big win on the road just hoping we'll get in a different pattern of getting in winning position way before five minutes left in the fourth quarter.

Jordan looked off, which is not surprising given that she missed two games with illness. She was had a couple of bad shooting nights before that and the team really needs her to break out of this slump.

It will be interesting to see Rae's progression as she works back in the line-up. For this team to really separate from SEC competition (i.e. win by comfortable margins) without an impactful Rae and Horston. They need that offensive spark. Hopefully, it will only be one or two more games before both are back full strength and no more injuries to anyone.
 
Probably would not say this if they had lost, but they did play some stout defense on the perimeter too. They made a choice to make the guard/wing get over the screen instead of sending Key out there to get burned for easy Arky looks at the basket. This team prides itself on defense, and I bet each one tasked with getting over that screen for Ramirez took the task to heart. This will give them great clips to learn from. This was an improvement from the WV game playing the same defense. If they hadn’t played this way it would’ve been a layup drill. Instead they pressured Arkansas and made them shoot 40 threes.
 
Last edited:
Jordan looked off, which is not surprising given that she missed two games with illness. She was had a couple of bad shooting nights before that and the team really needs her to break out of this slump.

It will be interesting to see Rae's progression as she works back in the line-up. For this team to really separate from SEC competition (i.e. win by comfortable margins) without an impactful Rae and Horston. They need that offensive spark. Hopefully, it will only be one or two more games before both are back full strength and no more injuries to anyone.

It's been astounding to me to see what this team has done without Rae and Jordy, sometimes in games without one of them, sometimes without both of them. Rae is the go-to scorer and cool customer senior leader, and Jordy is the high-energy, do it all athlete that is depended on for so many things. That this team is 13-1 now is huge. lIke you say, if we can get both back in good health and conditioning, look out SEC.

As to Jordy's slump, I was surprised to see her overall shooting % so far (36) is about what it was last year (35), but not surprised to see her 3-ball % is down alot from 28 to 17%. Her FT % is down from 73 to 66. But her rebounds are up from 3.9 to 9.2 rpg.
 
It's been astounding to me to see what this team has done without Rae and Jordy, sometimes in games without one of them, sometimes without both of them. Rae is the go-to scorer and cool customer senior leader, and Jordy is the high-energy, do it all athlete that is depended on for so many things. That this team is 13-1 now is huge. lIke you say, if we can get both back in good health and conditioning, look out SEC.

As to Jordy's slump, I was surprised to see her overall shooting % so far (36) is about what it was last year (35), but not surprised to see her 3-ball % is down alot from 28 to 17%. Her FT % is down from 73 to 66. But her rebounds are up from 3.9 to 9.2 rpg.

Her numbers have really dropped in the last few games. She was shooting much than last year in the earlier part of the season but went 5-19 against stanford and 3-13 yesterday which is 25% across those two games. (she was 3-9 against ETSU, which given the level of the comp is a little low as well). Yesterday, she missed in an almost identical on 3 or 4 shots where she got to the rim but shot the ball short, where it almost got stuck between rim and backboard. It seemed like she was going for a bank shot but got the angles all wrong. A few good sessions in the gym and she should be able to work off that bit of rust.
 
Her numbers have really dropped in the last few games. She was shooting much than last year in the earlier part of the season but went 5-19 against stanford and 3-13 yesterday which is 25% across those two games. (she was 3-9 against ETSU, which given the level of the comp is a little low as well). Yesterday, she missed in an almost identical on 3 or 4 shots where she got to the rim but shot the ball short, where it almost got stuck between rim and backboard. It seemed like she was going for a bank shot but got the angles all wrong. A few good sessions in the gym and she should be able to work off that bit of rust.

But she also got 7 rebounds and 5 assists, so she is working hard on both ends even though her shooting is a struggle. Kudos to her maturity for not letting her shooting slump hurt the team any more than just that.
 
Wrote this on December 19. This is what she shot in the 3 games leading up to the Stanford game.

If she shot 36% last year and so far 35% this year, it’s not just a slump. She has made some big baskets in the last 5 minutes of games, but defense is her game, and our best shooters need to be taking the majority of shots. Thankfully, Rae is back, and Horston needs to get the ball to our best shooter.



Horston’s shooting average is not just because of the opponent, and is nothing new.

In our last four games, she shot:

TN Tech 4-11
Virginia Tech 3-13
GA ST 4-15
Stanford 5-19
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: youcancallmeAl

VN Store



Back
Top