Texas A&M gave Tennessee all it could handle on Thursday night, but the Lady Vols escaped College Station with a 62-50 win.
Offense came at a premium on Thursday night. Tennessee shot 41% from the field compared to the Aggies’ 30%.
Texas A&M, with only seven active players, knew slowing the game down would be tough on Tennessee.
“Obviously I think our players early on played frustrated, especially on the offensive end and the way (Texas A&M) play. They slow it down and move the ball and really kind of suck the energy out of you and that’s what they did,” head coach Kellie Harper said. “And we kind of allowed that. I thought we didn’t have the ball movement early on that we needed and allowed their defense just to really collapse in and make things difficult for us.”
Rickea Jackson led the way for the Lady Vols. She finished with 22 points on 9-16 shooting.
Turnovers were an issue for Tennessee in College Station. The Lady Vols turned it over 20 times, resulting in 16 points for Texas A&M.
“We had some uncharacteristic turnovers,” Harper said. “That’s where I thought we played a little frustrated. You’ve got to move on quick. We’ve got to clean those turnovers up.”
Neither team had a good offensive performance in the first quarter. Texas A&M couldn’t capitalize on its defense performance, hitting just one field goal in the first quarter and shooting 8% from the field.
The first quarter was the lowest points Tennessee has scored in a quarter all season.
“We were coming off probably one of our poorest quarters of the season, to be honest with you, and just couldn’t find the basket,” Harper said. “I thought we were rushing some things.”
The offensive woes for the Aggies continued in the second. It took four minutes for Texas A&M to hit a field goal in the second quarter. The offense wouldn’t last long.
Tennessee finished the half on a 3:34-minute scoring drought. The Aggies went into half on a 2:46-minute scoring drought. The score was 23-17 at the half.
Jackson was the only life Tennessee has in the second, scoring 10 points on 5-6 shooting.
“(Jackson) was able to come in there, she was active, she got some scores a lot of different ways,” Harper said of Jackson in the second. “People found her and obviously finished and got us at least on the map offensively.”
Overall, the first half was arguably Tennessee’s worse of the season.
“We had three people make baskets in the first half,” Harper said. “We’ve got to share the ball and spread it out a little bit more. We’ve got to have people finishing around the basket. We ended up with seven people that made baskets, so that was much a better job second half.”
The third quarter saw a little more life on the offensive end, largely thanks to Jackson. The Lady Vols shot 53.3% in the third. The Aggies also saw more offensive success in the third, shooting 40%.
The Aggies didn’t go away in the fourth quarter. Texas A&M ripped off a 7-0 run in the fourth quarter to bring it within seven. A Jordan Horston three-point play sealed the game for Tennessee at around the two-minute mark.
“Obviously that was a big jumper,” Harper said of Horston’s three-point play. “She made some big plays when we needed it.”
Horston finished with 12 points and five boards on Thursday.
Harper has said it a lot recently, she would rather her team learn from a win instead of a loss. With Georgia coming to Thompson-Boling Arena, Harper and her staff will have some time and plenty of film to teach from after Thursday’s game.
“That’s what I told our team,” Harper said. “Obviously we want to be better, and we were imploring them to learn from the win instead of a loss. It’s so much easier, and hopefully they can take that to heart and we can find a way whether that’s Friday or Saturday to figure some things out and be better for Sunday.”
