by Jay King
KNOXVILLE, Tenn – The Tennessee Lady Volunteers get their biggest win of the season yet, as they defeat the Florida State Seminoles 79-77.
This was a game that should not have been this close though, as the Lady Vols’ largest lead was when they were up by 20, 47-27 at the start of the third quarter.
Just like versus Liberty and MTSU, they struggled in the third quarter, this time getting outscored 30-12. Head Coach Kim Caldwell said “Our third quarters are terrible, so we got to do a better job at halftime, just making sure that we don’t look at the scoreboard then start to take bad shots and take our foot off the gas, and not play as hard.”
On a positive note, Kim Caldwell gets her first victory over a power four opponent as the head coach for the Lady Vols, and is still undefeated as a head coach at 6-0.
Tonight’s leading scorer was Talaysia Cooper with 22 points, but Zee Spearman came in the clutch, as she scored 10 points in the final five minutes, and scored the game winning turn-around bucket with 24 seconds left.
The leading scorer for both teams though was the Seminoles’ T’Niya Latson who came out to play with 38 points, but she missed the game winning shot. She also scored 20 points in last year’s game in Tallahassee.
This is the beginning of a gauntlet schedule, as they face Iowa this Saturday, and get into conference play January 2nd.
Between the game versus Iowa, and the start of conference play, the Lady Vols have another stretch of matchups with mid-major schools, as their next home game will be versus North Carolina Central on December 14, then they play Memphis, Richmond, Tulsa, and Winthrop.