For Lady Vols coach Kim Caldwell, it's all about the number 10

Kim Caldwell and her coaching staff continue to work the transfer portal to add pieces to a roster that returns talent and is also welcoming in five high profile freshman who will factor from day one. 

The five high school signees have that class ranked as the top class in the country by some services. Caldwell and her staff also have three portal additions in SMU guard Nya Robertson as well as UCLA post player Janiah Barker and LSU post Jersey Wolfenbarger.

“The future is bright,” Caldwell said on Vol Club Confidential. “Our returners are hungry and focused. They have the right mentality. They stayed. They want to be here which is huge in this day and age because you always have a little bit of turnover with the players that played. And our players that got minutes aren’t leaving and I think that says a lot about what we’re doing here. We are having fun playing. We are playing a fun style. Our freshman class that is coming in we have five really good players that are going to be able to step in and help us right away which is big for freshmen. They are going to get that opportunity and they don’t get to be freshman for very long because they are going to be on the floor. They have to grow up quick. We’re just looking for the right pieces out of the transfer portal that can come in and help us get over the hump and help us get to the Elite 8 next year.”

To make that step, Caldwell’s obsession lies in one number — 10. Since the end of the season the fixation with 10 has been the focal point and it will remain the focal point the entire offseason. 

“About 10 points and the obsession of finding those 10 points has already started. Do we do that by better players? Do we do that by me being a better coach? Do we do that by different drills in practice? There’s a lot of ways you can get those ten points. Every player is one point better. That’s the mindset they have to bring every single day. How do we get those 10 points? We only lost one game by more than 10.  Our season would have been a top five season in the country if we could get that. So that’s the goal for next year. How do we improve? It doesn’t have to be a lot. We aren’t trying to find 30 points, we are trying to find 10.”

Kentucky routed the Lady Vols in late February by 24 points. The other 9 were by less than 10 and 6 were by 5 or less, which has created not just Caldwell’s talking point on the media trail but also internally with her whole team. And don’t think for a minute being close makes Tennessee’s head coach happy. 

“It’s two sided. You can pat yourself on the back for it or you can be really frustrated by it. For me, I was really frustrated by it,” Caldwell said. “Those 4, 5, 6 points are points I have to find a way to get back. We weren’t really able to do it last year so we have all summer to figure it out.”

Fans should not take that to mean that Caldwell was disappointed in the progress her program has made in a year. A team that many wondered if they would even make the tournament was tied with top seed Texas going into the fourth quarter in the Sweet 16 with an Elite 8 trip on the line. A team that Caldwell warned fans in November that the play would be ugly to start the year won their first 14 games. And it was a team that beat national champion UConn in February.

“I proud of how quickly we did it,” Caldwell said of the team she calls one of her favorites to coach.  “We finished the season top 15 and to do it in year one and to have that be our foundation and direction we want to go. Hopefully that’s our floor. Hopefully years one is maybe not the worst year you ever have, but hopefully we can grow on that. That’s what we wanted to do. That’s what this team’s focus was of getting us back in the top 25. They exceeded that. They got us back in the top 15, made the sweet 16 and they had a lot of fun doing it. It’s just a good body of work that we had in year one. I will always be thankful to that class of seniors that came in and just did it the right way.”