Rick Barnes calls for Tennessee fans to take over SEC Tournament: ‘A sea of Volunteers’

No. 4 Tennessee closed out the regular season winning five of its final six games, including Saturday’s 75-65 home win over South Carolina.

Now, as the Volunteers head to Nashville as the No. 4 seed in next week’s 2025 SEC Men’s Basketball Tournament, head coach Rick Barnes is calling on “a sea of Volunteers” to flood Bridgestone Arena.

“I hope it’s not a neutral site, I’m hoping Nashville’s a sea of Volunteers when we’re there,” Barnes said during Saturday’s postgame press conference. “I want to thank our fan base for today, I didn’t know how this would turn out going into a game (after Wednesday’s road loss at Ole Miss), and for our fanbase to show their support here again, it was just really unbelievable. But I shouldn’t be surprised because we’ve got the best fanbase in the country.”

As the fourth seed, Tennessee earned the league’s final double-bye and will begin SEC Tournament play Friday in the tournament quarterfinals. There, the Vols will face the winner of Thursday’s second-round game between No. 5 seed Texas A&M and the Game 2 winner of 12th-seeded Vanderbilt and No. 13 seed Texas, which tips mid-afternoon Wednesday.

No. 4 Tennessee (25-6, 12-6 SEC) has been one of the NCAA’s most electric teams this season, winning its first 14 games of the season and closing out the regular season winning eight of its final 10 games. That success has all-but assured the Volunteers of earning at least a No. 2 seed in the upcoming NCAA Tournament, which begins with the First Four games on March 18.

On3 bracketologist James Fletcher III currently has Tennessee as the second seed in the South Region, while ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi projects the Vols as a 2-seed in the East Region.

Of course, if Tennessee is going to improve their March Madness chances and lock up a coveted No. 1 seed, Barnes knows it’ll need a deep run in Nashville. That would likely require the Vols knocking off top-seeded and No. 1 Auburn — the overwhelming favorite to earn the NCAA’s top overall seed — in the tournament semifinals and making the SEC Tournament championship game Sunday.

“You get to tournament play, we expect our fans to be with us and we want to play and certainly we don’t want to disappoint them,” Barnes said.

Rick Barnes after Ole Miss loss: ‘We didn’t deserve to win this basketball game’

Rick Barnes isn’t sugar coating his team’s performance. After the Volunteers’ 78-76 loss to Ole Miss on Wednesday, the Tennessee head coach didn’t mince words.

“We didn’t deserve to win this basketball game,” Barnes said. “When you make those kind of mental mistakes, you don’t deserve to play against the team that is well-coached and played as hard as they played. And they made shots on us.

“Again, you let a team get comfortable and you’re not as aggressive and you’re not playing smart. Offensive rebounding can just take the wind out of your sail. And they did a great job getting there and, I think, 46 points in the paint. I don’t know what else I can say. Just disappointed. Most of the time in games like this, certainly from where I’m sitting right now, I think you get what you deserved. And we deserved to lose because we didn’t make enough plays to win the game.”

In the loss, Tennessee allowed Ole Miss to record 15 offensive rebounds compared to its mere eight. The Rebels’ offensive rebounds were only one sign of their dominance down low.

Ole Miss outscored Tennessee 46-20 in paint points. Thanks to their efforts, the Rebels ultimately recorded 14 more shot attempts than Tennessee in the game.

On3’s Grant Grubbs contributed to this report.