It's a sad day in God's country...

Let me first address the statement I’ve heard going around of “well I guess that proves Tennessee didn’t deserve a one seed”. That is quite simply erroneous on all accounts.

Tournament play happens after seeding is set. The Vols may have struggled some after the Memphis win but their overall body of work still should have made them a one seed, plain and simple. This is not me making excuses, I can’t make excuses after the performance last night, I hardly even know how to describe it.

But getting back to my first point, the East region featured the best one seed, best two seed, and best three seed. I’m not sure I can explain why that happened but the explanation from the committee was that they wanted to put Tennessee as close to Knoxville as possible. Gee thanks.

Last nights game did not prove that Tennessee didn’t deserve a one seed. Frankly I’m not sure what last nights game proved. I honestly can’t think of a game I’ve ever watched in any sport that made me more frustrated. I don’t know what happened to this team. They still had the heart to win, but something was just off.

I don’t want to jump to conclusions here because I admittedly aren’t thinking completely rationally yet but upon my initial viewing of the game I would have to place the blame squarely on the shoulders of Bruce Pearl. I am about to elaborate and then defend him, which should further demonstrate why I am so torn up inside.

Guard play is essential in the tournament, it is argued by some to even be more important than post play. Prior to the tournament games Tennessee was 29-4. Things were working. Maybe not to the maximum capacity but they were working.

Our guard play was a little inconsistent to say the least but I felt like the team knew how to manage other aspects of the offense to minimize the loss at that position. Once we got into the tournament however Bruce moved JP to point and rotated Ramar in some. His reasoning was that he wanted to have his best playmakers on the floor the most time possible. That’s great, and I even agree with that logic, but you simply don’t wait until the tournament to start trying that. Granted it got us through a couple games, barely. But I don’t think anyone was too confident in the scheme, including the players.

I think this is a classic case of over-coaching. I feel like as the season wrapped up Bruce got harder and harder on the guys and saw potential for improvement (further evidence given in press conferences where Bruce repeatedly would say that we “have yet to play our best game”). He was right, there definitely was further room for improvement.

However he was wrong to wait until when he did to start trying to mix things up. And I’m not only referring to the point guard position. What was with Steven Pearl and Ryan Childress seeing minutes in the first half? For someone who justifies starting JP at point by wanting to have the most talented playmakers on the floor he sure did contradict himself. I realize we had foul trouble but we have good enough players to play smart. Steven Pearl and Ryan Childress are not a solution to anything.

Additionally I thought we made the same coaching mistake we have made the past several games. We over pressed and/or insufficiently pressed. I’m all about the full court pressure defense, and it does force a lot of turnovers and force opponents to play into our style of play, but when it is exploited over and over you have to pick and choose your times better. We gave up way too many easy baskets because of the full court pressure. I know we forced a lot of turnovers but I think that us pressing like we did also forced a lot of turnovers by us.

How many times did we steal the ball and then throw it away? A lot. I think we got too rushed and panicky early from the press and having JP running the point. Then Ramar would come in and play out of control. Ramar cutting to the basket is his strength, but that strategy was not what we needed when it was implemented. Padgett knew what was coming every time. Rammer is effective when we had been shooting well already and were in a rhythm. People would have to contest the outside shots harder thus opening the lane for him to slash.

I am just so disappointed in the overall performance. And I’m sure that Bruce isn’t solely to blame but the only other players I could look at and blame would be JP and Ramar and I thought that they were insufficiently guided at their position…or they played like it anyway. And what is with Jordan Howell not seeing one minute of playing time in his final game? I know the guy has been struggling, but if Steven Pearl and Ryan Childress are going to play in a game Howell should too. Bad streaks eventually get broken. What if it would finally have been the time? I just don’t know I agree with hardly any of your game plan Bruce…

Finally in his defense, I watched his pre-game press conference on Wednesday and he was talking about the amount of time and effort he and his staff had put into preparing for this game. He said it felt like they had matched the amount of effort put into every other game combined in just this one game. I know that he was confident in what he was doing was the right thing. And I trust him and his judgment. I certainly can’t argue with his record and accomplishments. But I think he may have outdone himself this time. I think they over analyzed this Louisville team and had the players up tight coming into it. They weren’t playing in any sort of rhythm and didn’t seem to be having fun like they were early in the year. I’m sure going to miss Chris Lofton, JaJuan Smith, and Jordan Howell. It’s a sad day in God’s Country.