When the Austin Peay Governors rolled into Knoxville, the No. 7 Tennessee Volunteers expected a tough game.

Wrong.

The Vols put on a basketball clinic Monday night as they beat Austin Peay 98-65 in front of 13,911 fans at Thompson-Boling Arena as well as nearly 20 NBA scouts.

It was a little bit easier game than I thought it would be, head coach Jerry Green said. I think we’re playing a little bit better as time goes along and I’m pleased with our effort tonight.

Tennessee lived above the rim as 24 points came from dunks. Highlighting the dunkfest was back-to-back alley-oops courtesy of the Tony Harris-to-Isiah Victor connection which followed a Victor solo jam.

Harris was the floor general for Tennessee, shooting his way to a 8-of-10 performance for 20 points, 12 assists and one turnover.

Five other Volunteers netted double figures. Vincent Yarbrough had 15 points and six boards followed by Marcus Haislip’s 14 points and three blocked shots coming off the bench.

Harris Walker scored 12 points while Jon Higgins and Victor had 11 apiece.

The Vols also dished out 25 total assists on the night.

Everybody’s just trying to make the extra pass and let everybody have a little bit of the glory, Walker said.

We didn’t expect this. We thought they were pretty solid.

As for Austin Peay, star swingman Trenton Hassell was the key to staying alive. Hassell scored 22 points on 8-of-13 shooting.

Hassell was the primary target for the Volunteers. They didn’t expect to stop him but they partially contained him.

I thought we did a lot better job on him in the second half, Green said. But he did a great job with 22 points.

Austin Peay kept things interesting for much of the first half. Then it was time for the men in orange to go to work.

Nine minutes into the game, the Governors held on to a slim 19-18 lead. However, Ron Slay’s turnaround jam in the lane sparked a 10-0 run by the Vols.

During that span, Harris drained consecutive threes followed by an oop to Haislip.

Hassell helped the Governors stay afloat but Tennessee was only shifting gears as they extended the lead to 51-34 by the break.

The start of the second half looked more like the start of the Kentucky Derby as the Tennessee thoroughbreds went on a 20-5 run to begin the begin the half.

The thing we like is to keep playing solid basketball, Green said of UT’s run. Forget about the lead and just play even-even.

We need to keep a good workman attitude and not get into this fancy stuff that we do, especially when the lead is a lot.

Yarbrough’s three from the top of the key spurred the run.

Last week we dropped in the rankings from eight to nine, Yarbrough said, and I think we’re going to send the message from here on out that we’re a better team than everybody thinks we are.

Although playing lackadaisical at times, Tennessee’s second team of Walker, Jenis Grindstaff, Terrence Woods, Haislip and Slay finished out the game.

It seemed as though Austin Peay head coach Dave Loos conceded defeat as he pulled his starters with almost four minutes remaining.

It was getting pretty boring until somebody would excite the crowd, Yarbrough said laughing. They were looked bad sometimes but any team will do that down by 30 or 40.

Tennessee shot a blistering 58.8 percent from the floor while going 10-of-18 from behind the arc. The Vols also outscored the Govs 60-40 in the paint and 20-8 from fast breaks.

Tennessee returns to the court on Thursday when they host North Carolina-Asheville.