Tennessee Basketball Mid-Term Grades Are In
by Joel Hollingsworth on Feb 7, 2012 10:00 AM EST
in Rocky Top Talking Points
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We're halfway through the SEC basketball season, and Mike Griffith, using a fairly generous curve, gives Tennessee a mid-term grade of B-. Mostly, the components are made up of a bunch of C+s, but the team gets a great deal of extra credit for intangibles.
Much of the positive intangibles vibe, to me anyway, comes from a certain tenuous optimism about the remainder of the season. Coach Martin seems to be successfully selling his defense-first system to his players, and he seems to be pulling the right strings and pushing the right buttons, although I call liar liar pants on fire on his claim that he wasn't sending a message to Trae Golden by removing him from the starting lineup. It's an I'm-not-saying-I'm-just-saying kind of deal, and Golden wasn't the only one to get the non-message. By the way, it's sounding like Golden's quick and positive response is going to earn him his starting gig back tomorrow night.
So we're trending in the right direction with an easier schedule on the horizon. VolQuest notes that the rest of the schedule is 50/50 home and away and that to finish 8-8 the team will have to win at home against South Carolina, Ole Miss, Arkansas, and Vanderbilt, but also find some way to win one on the road against Florida, Alabama, South Carolina, and LSU. Looks like it might come down to the wire, with a ton of teams bunched up and jockeying for seeding the rest of the way. Fun.
A few extra Talking Points tidbits after the jump.
Five underrated classes - College Football - Rivals.com
Tennessee: Derek Dooley has been getting slammed in Knoxville due to an offseason filled with upheaval on the coaching staff, but the third-year Volunteers head coach once again assembled a solid core of recruits. Dooley wanted to add playmakers on offense, and signing top junior college receiver Cordarrelle Patterson on National Signing Day was a great way to round out the class. Justin Hunter will be 100 percent healthy next season, Da’Rick Rogers will return as well, and Drae Bowles of Jackson, Tenn., and Alton Howard of Orlando, Fla., add some serious depth to the Vols' WR corps. Quarterback Tyler Bray will certainly have plenty of weapons to work with in the fall, but we'll see if not being able to land a standout running back in this class will hurt the offense. I'm not sure if Alden Hill or Quenshaun Watson will be able to help the ground attack in 2012.
University of Tennessee Athletics: Men's Basketball
Coming in as a sub, Hall said, actually has given him an advantage by allowing him to scout out what the opponent's post players are doing in the paint.
Martin Media Luncheon Transcript
Listen Back To Coach Dooley's Interview On Sportstalk - Tennessee
Vols head coach Derek Dooley took part in an interview on the Sports Animal's Sportstalk with Jimmy Hyams and John Wilkerson on Monday. Listen back to the interview in these segments:The interview starts in the first segment at the 5:35...
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Coming in as a sub...
…has given Hall an advantage by ensuring that he doesn’t pick up 3 fouls in the first five minutes of the game.
No homer.
by kidbourbon on Feb 7, 2012 10:25 AM EST via mobile reply actions 2 recs
I saw "mid-term"
and was expecting this. Which is depressing. For football
If I cared more about my UNC side, I'd call myself "Tar Volon," and that'd be awesome.
Bolts, Canes, Preds (now in different conferences!). Canes mini-STH. Southern hockey solidarity
Rocky Top Talk
by Incipient_Senescence on Feb 7, 2012 10:29 AM EST reply actions
This seems like a stretch to me:
The University of Tennessee football team had a “tough fall” academically, which may have been related to their on-the-field performance, said NCAA faculty representative Dan Murphy in a presentation to university faculty Monday.
“My point was that generally people do better in the classroom when they’re doing better in the rest of their life,” Murphy said following the UT Faculty Senate meeting. “When you’re suffering from disappointments, it’s hard.”
Lou Brock loves Lamp.
Yeah I saw that
That statement actually made sense to me, though. When things start to go bad it seems like everything starts to go bad. It’s all related, I think, and having one part of your life suck can make it more difficult to have a positive attitude other areas. But maybe that’s just me.
Chief Editor, Rocky Top Talk. Chief in Charge of Woo, Gameday Depot.
by Joel Hollingsworth on Feb 7, 2012 11:15 AM EST up reply actions
I don't think it's a stretch
It’s like when you’re going through a bad breakup. Everything feels like a slog, and it’s harder to motivate yourself to be excellent. These are times that separate the excellent from the average, but still, it’s harder to function when you are suffering from major disappointment.
I guess it depends...
… on how cynical you are about the “student/athlete” charade.
Losing football games doesn’t ever seem to hurt Vandy’s players’ grades.
Lou Brock loves Lamp.
Even Vandy...
doesn’t come close to the 3.0 mark with their football team.
They’ve virtually eliminated the restrictive standards on student athletes to put themselves in line with the rest of the SEC.
Not to mention that losing is what Vandy does, so it’s not as bad of a day for them.
Chief Editor, Rocky Top Talk. Chief in Charge of Woo, Gameday Depot.
by Joel Hollingsworth on Feb 7, 2012 5:27 PM EST up reply actions
A question:
I know about and understand eliminating the divisions in SEC basketball this year. I’m just wondering about the schedule. Shouldn’t it be a little more balanced? I mean, it looks like we are still playing all the “East” teams twice and the “West” teams only once, just like always. So, if we are competing with Ole Miss, Auburn, etc in that jockeying for seeding, don’t they have an advantage by not playing Kentucky, Florida, and Vanderbilt twice? It just seems like eliminating the divisions without changing the scheduling is sort of pointless.
"It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone." A. Bartlett Giamatti
My guess (and it's without any actual information)
is that the only way they could get the West teams to agree to a non-divisional alignment was to give them a binnie in the schedule for a year or two. The East has wanted to shed the divisions for years, but the West enjoyed the preferential seeding. This just seems (to me ) as a concession to finally get them to sign off on it.
Totally unfair? Yup. But it’s not like the West held out on this for reasons of fairness.
by David Hooper on Feb 7, 2012 12:36 PM EST up reply actions
You are 100% correct
From a scheduling perspective, absolutely nothing changed. The move was solely to avoid situations like 2007 (where an 8-8 MSU team got a bye and a 10-6 UT team lost in the first round) or 2008 (where a 9-7 Arky team got a bye and beat a 10-6 Vandy team playing their 2nd game in 24 hours) or 2010 (where 9-7 MSU and Ole Miss got byes while 11-5 UT did not).
Obviously nobody knew this when it started, but even that system will likely change once we figure out the 14-team league. Change can be so fun!
I like Tennessee and Vanderbilt. There aren't many like me, and they're probably better off for it.
Northern VA
If you’re anywhere close to DC, you should check out a game at Blackfinn in DC sometime. They play Rocky Top after every score.
by CobbWebbAttack on Feb 7, 2012 4:11 PM EST up reply actions
I am actually in DC now
I met up with Pendley for the UF game, but after Hunter tore his ACL, I’ll probably never do that again ;)
I like Tennessee and Vanderbilt. There aren't many like me, and they're probably better off for it.
by VolnVA on Feb 7, 2012 9:47 PM EST via iPhone app up reply actions
I've seen multiple games at that spot.
The one you show up for, you get there just in time to see Hunter blow his ACL. Just sayin’.
Formerly 'snail. You get used to it after a while.
by Chris Pendley on Feb 8, 2012 7:15 AM EST up reply actions
I actually drove to Gainesville for that game,
forgot my ticket in the hotel (actually I confused it for another ticket from a home game I was using as a bookmark), had to drive back to Alachua to get it, and then got there right after Hunter tore his ACL.
I'm undefeated in Gainesville...
I think you guys should start donating away game tickets to me if you REALLY want UT to win.
With heavy talent at WR, Da'Rick better fix the attitude problems or he may see time behind the big white stripe
We could use a top flight RB, but we need to figure out how to do something beside pass block.
As to Hoops, somewhere between 6-10 and 8-8 seems reasonable with the schedule we have left. Beat the teams we should beat and pull one upset – and we get to even money.
Please stop talking about winning the SEC Tourney. Not even Calipari can screw up the talent he has at UK. (Yes, he almost succeeded at TBA, but…)
Stokes'd about ZoVols - don't care what the record is.
A girl can dream......
"It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone." A. Bartlett Giamatti
And, we hope your dreams are fulfilled... with a UK loss and a UT sweep of the SEC tourney.
We could use an improved set of results at the SEC tourney.
Stokes'd about ZoVols - don't care what the record is.
Just don't believe it's likely enough to spend a lot of time considering.
Stokes'd about ZoVols - don't care what the record is.
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