What Rick Barnes said after Tennessee escaped against Colgate

Tennessee was pushed to the limit today in Columbus against a hot-shooting Colgate team. The 15th seeded Raiders came up just short of the upset, however, with Admiral Schofield burying two clutch corner three-pointers late to put this one on ice.

Here’s what Rick Barnes said after the game.

Opening Thoughts

“A game like today is what makes the NCAA Tournament the NCAA Tournament. You get a team from a league where, you’ve got a group of guys that just love to play basketball. That’s what it looked like today. They earned their right here.”

On Jordan Burns...

“What can you say about Jordan Burns? I mean he was terrific. He had a magnet in that ball. But I thought they played really hard.”

“He’s better in person than he was on tape, I can tell you that. You knew he was the kind of guard who controls the ball very well. He goes right a lot — as much as you try and keep him from doing that, he still mixes it up. He’s got a quick release. We were switching on some ball screens and he took advantage.”

“I told him he was terrific. I’d like to have him on our team tomorrow — I shouldn’t say that (laughs) that might be called — scratch that.”

On Tennessee’s anxiety...

“I thought we were anxious. I thought we were showing too much anxiety. I think some of it goes to a year ago. We came in here and we talked to the team about it last night — when we had the big lead against Wright State. I told the coaches when we started out the way we did, this is not good. I thought our guys just thought it was going to be that way. Then they came back and got back in the game.”

On Colgate’s gameplan...

“They were daring us to shoot it early. I didn’t think we worked hard enough — Grant Williams didn’t really fight for his positioning. I didn’t think we were very good defensively. I don’t want to take anything away from Colgate because those guys played their hearts out. But to get through this tournament, you’re going to have games like this. You’ve got to love Colgate and what they did today. It’s kind of what I thought they would do. We told our guys last night, don’t expect it to be easy.”

On frustrations with Tennessee settling for long-range shots...

“It’s frustrating because we know what that’s done to us in all five losses. We don’t mind taking them if it’s in the flow of what we’re doing. But it’s when we just settle. We did that too much too early.”

On Colgate’s Rapolas Ivanauskas getting hurt (eye)...

“That probably helped them in the long run. Because they could really spread you out then”