Everything Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes said after loss to Ole Miss

The Ole Miss men’s basketball team defeated No. 4 Tennessee, 78-76, on Wednesday, making history in the process with the first season to have beaten two Top 5 teams.

In the regular season home finale the Rebels put on a show for the fans. Senior Jaemyn Brakefield scored 19 points in the second half, putting his team on his shoulders. He hit the game-winning shot on a put back from a missed three-point shot by Sean Pedulla with seven seconds left.

The win snapped the Volunteers (24-6, 11-6 Southeastern Conference) four-game winning streak and gave the Rebels (21-9, 10-7) its second-straight win.

Below is everything Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes said about Brakefield and Ole Miss after the game.

What went wrong for Tennessee in the closing minutes

“Well, give Coach (Chris) Beard and his staff credit. I thought he had his guys much more ready to play than I did. And some of the plays we gave up, forget the last two minutes. It’s the things we did throughout the game, not sticking to our scouting report, transition defense, going at it half-speed, offensive rebounding on their half. They had 46 points in the second half and we just weren’t making plays. But again, I don’t want to take anything away from them. I told our team, I thought (Ole Miss) wanted the game more, which is always disappointing. And we didn’t have the focus that we had. We came out and they took a shot, missed it, had a chance to get the defensive rebound and go down and maybe win the game. We didn’t. Executed what we wanted to do there at the end, just didn’t come up with a shot at the end.”

Ole Miss having so many three-point play opportunities

“It’s ridiculous. And we talk about having confrontation. We play like we were — that’s soft, honestly. That’s being soft. That’s you not really trying to go in and make plays on the ball. And guys slide out of the way. There’s got to be a confrontation there. And we’ve been a pretty good rim-protecting team this year, but we weren’t tonight. And you can’t give up, I mean, I don’t know how many and-ones. And we foul on a three-point shooter again, give up a four-point play there. We foul 75 feet from the basket, things like that. That’s a recipe for losing. And that’s what we did.”

On Jaemyn Brakefield’s second-half performance

“I love him. I love the way he plays. I love his game. He’s patient and everything he did with his shot fakes, driving. I mean, think about it. We wanted him to shoot threes. So if you want a guy to shoot a three, why would you ever take a shot fake. And we kept leaving our feet and he doesn’t need much room. He’s a really good angle player, got great hands and again, he’s a terrific player. He had his way with us. I mean, anybody, we tried different guys on him, but whatever he wanted to do, (he did). You let a player like that start feeling good, that rim opens up for him, (gets) bigger, but he really fought hard to get space where he wanted it, which really good players do and that’s what he did.”

His thoughts on Ole Miss’ chances in the NCAA Tournament

“I think anybody in our (league that) gets in the tournament, (has) a chance. I mean, anybody in this league, because we saw early in the year, Oklahoma, go win the Bahamas. You saw what we did historically (in the) non-league, and you got a team like, think about Oklahoma, went through that field down there and won it. Georgia early in the year, beat St. John’s, who’s had a fabulous year. South Carolina beat Clemson early in the year. So I would say anybody in the tournament, I think this about anybody, you get in the tournament based on bracketing, based on matchups, they could do as much damage as anybody in our league. And I’d say that about any team of ours that gets into the tournament.”