Rick Barnes reveals initial thoughts on opening round matchup

Tennessee, seeded as a No. 4 in the East Region, is matched up with No. 13 Louisiana to open the NCAA Tournament. However, the Ragin’ Cajuns are a team that Rick Barnes says the Volunteers are familiar with from top to bottom.

Barnes previewed the matchup during his press conference on Monday. He says he and head coach Bob Marlin go way back to his time in Austin. After that, he also spoke highly of star center Jordan Brown, a player he recruited to Knoxville, and his teammates for their success this season.

“I’ve known Bob Marlin from my time at Texas. Bob is a terrific basketball coach,” said Barnes. “A great offensive mind and his teams are always so sound. I think we’ve played them once or twice since we’ve been here.”

“Jordan Brown? We recruited here. He’s a McDonald’s All-American, a high-level player,” Barnes said. “Bob’s done a terrific job with him by putting him in areas on the court where he can be very effective…He’s got good shooters around him and good point guard play.”

Tennessee has crossed paths with Louisiana before in Barnes’ tenure at Tennessee. In 2018, they opened their season with an 87-65 win.

However, this isn’t just any old Ragin’ Cajun team that Marlin has had in his 13 seasons. This is just his second roster that has earned a bid in March Madness out of the Sun Belt. The other one, led by lottery pick Elfrid Payton, lost in the first round to Creighton during 2014’s NCAA Tournament

Now, Marlin has Brown (19.4 points, 8.7 rebounds, 57% shooting from the field) leading his second tournament team in 2023. Still, low seed or not, Barnes has nothing but high esteem for the program that the Volunteers will face on Thursday night. In the end, they were one of the 68 teams that made the field and that’s all Barnes thinks Tennessee needs to know to understand how good their opponent in Orlando will be.

“If you’re in this tournament? You’re good and you’ve had success. You oughta feel good, you oughta be confident,” Barnes said. “So, again, I just have tremendous respect for Bob and what he’s done with that program.”