No main American sport loves its narratives, and views them extra as absolutes, than males’s faculty basketball.
Mike Krzyzewski simply can’t win the massive one.
A freshman-led workforce won’t ever lower down the nets.
The SEC won’t ever be a respectable basketball convention.
No main American sport loves doing extra of a 180 when these narratives get ripped to shreds in March than males’s faculty basketball.
Coach Okay is the fashionable day John Picket.
Carmelo Anthony and Anthony Davis are March icons.
The SEC could have put collectively the perfect convention within the historical past of school basketball.
With regards to March and narratives which have but to be flipped on their heads, everybody is aware of what Tennessee’s is.
Comparatively talking, the Volunteers have an especially proud faculty hoops custom. They’ve gained 16 convention championships, superior to the Candy 16 of the NCAA match 11 instances, and have extra all-time wins than nationwide championship-winning applications like Virginia, Georgetown and Marquette.
From “The Fearless 5” period to the “Ernie and Bernie Present” to the fashionable success below Bruce Pearl and Rick Barnes, there’s lots for UT followers to thump their chests about.
The chest thumping involves an abrupt halt when the subject of school basketball’s largest platform is introduced up.
Discover any listing of “greatest faculty basketball groups to by no means make a Closing 4” from any web site throughout any time interval, and Tennessee is definite to be at or close to the highest. The Volunteers have made the NCAA Match a extremely respectable 27 instances. Solely BYU has heard its identify referred to as on Choice Sunday extra instances with out taking part in in a Closing 4.
Not solely have the Volunteers by no means performed in a nationwide semifinal, however earlier than 2024, that they had a grand whole of 1 Elite Eight look in program historical past (2010).
After a surprising Candy 16 upset by the hands of Florida Atlantic in 2023, UT performed to its seed degree a season in the past, taking part in impressively for 3 rounds earlier than falling in a nip-and-tuck affair in opposition to top-seeded and eventual nationwide runner-up Purdue. Even it was anticipated by most, the lack to get win No. 4 within the Massive Dance as soon as once more hooked up itself to Rocky High like a virus, plaguing the fan base for not less than one other 12 months.
The Vols, and their head coach, are as soon as once more a single victory away from lastly getting wholesome.
Regardless of earlier stops at George Mason, Windfall, Clemson and Texas, there may not be a coach within the nation who higher embodies the repute of Tennessee males’s basketball than Rick Barnes.
Solely three lively coaches in Division-I’ve extra profession wins hooked up to their identify than Barnes, who for many years has been extensively thought to be the most effective defensive minds in basketball. When Barnes arrived in Knoxville in 2015, he took over a UT program that had gained only one SEC match since 1979 and only a pair of standard season titles since 1982.
Underneath Barnes’ watch, the Volunteers have gained 4 SEC titles, they’ve made the NCAA Match seven consecutive instances, they usually’ve superior to the match’s second weekend in every of the final three years. True to Barnes’ repute, they’ve ranked within the high 5 of Ken Pomeroy’s adjusted defensive effectivity rankings in 5 consecutive seasons.
However Barnes, like this system he now serves because the frontman for, has struggled too usually within the video games that matter greater than all others.
He missed the NCAA Match only one time in 17 seasons at Texas, however his tenure was tormented by early losses within the match to lower-seeded groups and only a single journey to a Closing 4. Maybe most infamously, Barnes turned generally known as the man who couldn’t get a workforce with Kevin Durant out of the match’s first weekend in 2007.
The common season success tempered by postseason disappointments adopted Barnes to Knoxville. There was a buzzer-beating loss to Loyola in 2018, an extra time loss to Purdue in 2019, an upset loss to 12-seed Oregon State in 2021 after which to 11-seed Michigan a 12 months later, after which the heartbreak in opposition to Florida Atlantic the 12 months after that. Whereas the upset losses have disappeared the final couple of years, critics are nonetheless fast to level out that Barnes is 1-13 all-time within the match when going through better-seeded opponents.
This might all be on the verge of going away endlessly.
On Friday evening, Tennessee served up arguably its most spectacular efficiency of the season on inarguably its greatest stage of the season. A minimum of to this point.
Going through a Kentucky workforce it had already misplaced two twice through the common season, Barnes flipped the script. After permitting the Wildcats to dictate the tempo and knock down 12-of-24 from three in each of the earlier conferences, Barnes had his defenders promote out to run UK’s gifted group of out of doors shooters off the three-point line.
Tennessee dared UK to be the more durable and extra environment friendly workforce contained in the arc. Their rivals to the North couldn’t reply the bell.
Tennessee restricted Kentucky to only 6-of-15 taking pictures from three, with most of these makes coming after the Volunteers have been already holding a double-digit lead. UT additionally owned the glass on each ends, out-rebounding the equally-sized Wildcats by 10, together with a 14-7 edge on the offensive glass.
Zakai Zeigler, Tennessee’s fourth-year ground basic who performed subpar video games in opposition to Kentucky within the common season, utterly managed the movement of the sport. He completed with 18 factors and 10 assists, and persistently lower off UK’s guards on the level of assault, retaining the Wildcats from successfully upping the tempo.
The victory didn’t simply assure that Tennessee can be headed to regional finals in back-to-back years for the primary time in program historical past, it stored alive one other streak that could be simply as spectacular to UT followers: Barnes has by no means spent a season with the Volunteers the place he hasn’t overwhelmed Kentucky not less than as soon as.
For longtime followers of a program that had been persistently overwhelmed up by the kings of the SEC for many years, that’s virtually unattainable to imagine.
Between Zeigler (an undersized level guard who has been tormented by accidents all through his faculty profession), Chaz Lanier (the North Florida switch who has successfully stepped into the position left behind by All-American Dalton Knecht) and Jordan Gainey (maybe the perfect non-starter in all of school basketball), the Volunteers have the three faculty stars most say it is advisable to have with a purpose to be a respectable nationwide title risk.
The Vols additionally mix maybe the perfect workforce protection in all the nation with the perfect offensive numbers from a Barnes-coached workforce since 2019.
However … the narrative.
There is no such thing as a Cinderella left standing at this 12 months’s dance, and Tennessee’s presence is part of that. That’s to not say that there isn’t one thing of a romantic, underdog high quality concerning the Volunteers, the identical sort that grabs the nation’s consideration yearly round this time.
The 5’9 level guard who has been tormented by accidents all through his faculty profession.
The North Florida switch making good on his one shot on the massive stage.
The 70-year-old head coach now three wins away from avoiding a possible “the most effective to by no means win a title” legacy.
Probably the most profitable program in faculty basketball historical past to by no means play in a Closing 4.
The narrative is all the time the narrative till it isn’t.
The time for Tennessee to show that could be now.