With the loss of All-SEC forward Isabelle Harrison, head coach Holly Warlick felt the No. 6 Lady Vols needed to make a statement in Thursday’s matchup with Alabama.

Her team quickly answered the call.

Tennessee jumped out to a 16-2 lead, capped off by a mid-range jumper from forward Cierra Burdick, just eight minutes into the game, and never looked back, going on to beat the Crimson Tide 77-56. The win marked the 41st consecutive victory for the Lady Vols over Alabama.

“We try to attack the first four minutes of the basketball game, and really take their heart away,” Burdick said. “I think we did a good job of getting a quick start, and setting the tempo and playing the way we want to play.”

Burdick had seven points during the Lady Vols’ early run, and finished the game just one rebound shy of a double-double as she recorded 16 total points and nine rebounds on the night.

While Tennessee (23-3, 13-0 SEC) hit seven of its first 11 shots from the field, Alabama shot just 1-of-13 over the same stretch, and struggled to find any kind of rhythm on the offensive end of the floor.

With the absence of Harrison, guard Ariel Massengale found herself in the starting lineup for just the third time this year, and the senior made the most of her 31 minutes, scoring a team-high 17 points, while shooting 5-of-11 from the 3-point line.

“Whatever it takes for this team to win and us to get the W at the end of the night,” Massengale said. “So whether it’s coming off the bench, starting or scoring, playing defense; I’m willing to do whatever.”

Tennessee has struggled to put teams away at times this season, and for a few minutes in the second half it looked Alabama might be able to hang around.

The Crimson Tide (13-16, 2-11) managed to cut the deficit to 11 early in the second half, but Tennessee quickly put the game out of reach, going on a 22-4 run over a five-minute stretch, highlighted by 10 points from forward Bashaara Graves.

“We talked about this being a statement game,” Warlick said. “Just playing hard. I thought in the Kentucky game we played hard, and I wanted to carry it over to this game, and I thought we did some good things.”

Offensively, Alabama was led by forward Ashley Williams who scored 18 points and grabbed seven rebounds, but the Crimson Tide guards struggled for most of the night to find open shots against the Tennessee defense.

Alabama finished the game 3-of-14 from behind the 3-point line, but all three of the team’s triples came when the game was decided as the Crimson Tide started 0-of-11 from behind the arc.

While Tennessee won by 22 points, the final score did not reflect the Lady Vols’ dominance over Alabama. With six minutes left to play, Warlick pulled her starters with a 69-34 lead and allowed her bench to get some much needed minutes with the game out of reach.

The Lady Vols’ next contest comes Monday night at South Carolina, and Warlick felt it was nice to have a buffer game without Harrison, before traveling to face the No. 2 ranked team in the nation.

“We got a lot of people playing time,” Warlick said. “Now we get to talk about South Carolina, now that the Alabama game is over. It was good for us to go out and see just how hard we were going to play, what we were going to do without Isabelle’s presence.

“I thought it was very important for us for everyone to get out and everyone play and get up and down the floor.”