Saturday was a big night for basketball in Tennessee, and Calvin Mattheis of the Knoxville News Sentinel captured it on camera.
Fourth-placed Tennessee pulled away from tenth-placed Texas midway through the first half and never looked back in an 82-71 win over the Longhorns in front of a sold-out crowd of 21,678 at Thompson-Boling Arena.
Tennessee improved to 18-3 while Texas fell to 17-4.
Senior forward Olivier Nkamhoua led Tennessee with a career-best 27 points on 12-of-15 shooting, and he added eight rebounds and three assists and one blocked shot. Sophomore point guard Zakai Zeigler also had a big night for the Vols, amassing 20 points, 10 assists, four rebounds and two steals. Senior guard Josiah-Jordan James overcame some nasty difficulties to finish with 14 points, seven rebounds, two assists and a steal, and senior guard Santiago Vescovi added 12 points, eight rebounds and a steal.
While star senior guard Marcus Carr (11 points on 4-of-12 shooting) was kept in check, colleague Sir’Jabari Rice led Texas off the bench with 21 points in 31 minutes. Older striker Brock Cunningham added 11 points in 16 solid minutes off the bench.
No Texan player had more than five rebounds, and Tennessee finished the game with a commanding 38-23 edge on the glass. The Vols built a 22-point lead midway through the second half, but the Longhorns committed just nine turnovers — no small feat against the Tennessee defense — and made enough plays to close the gap a little.
Here’s another look at the action, courtesy of Calvin.
The first photo series from Saturday’s game can be found HERE.
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