No. 11 Tennessee stays hot against Austin Peay, 103-68
If this is the Igor Milicic Jr. that No. 11 Tennessee keeps getting, and if this is the way the Vols keep shooting the basketball, then lookout. Milicic scored a game-high 23 points and Tennessee shot 63.8% from the field while blitzing visiting Austin Peay 103-68 Sunday afternoon at Food City Center.
Milicic, who had 18 points and 10 rebounds in the win over Montana on Wednesday, scored 17 points of his 23 points in the first half on 8-for-10 shooting, as Tennessee (4-0) shot 70.4% from the field as a team in the first half. He finished 11-for-14 from the field Sunday with nine rebounds and four assists.
Zakai Ziegler had 19 points and eight assists, becoming just the fifth player in program history to reach 500 career assists, and shot 7-for-8 from the floor.
Jordan Gainey scored 15, Felix Okpara had 12 points and six rebounds and Cade Phillips scored a career-high 13 points and had a career-high nine rebounds. Jahmai Mashack had 10 points while going 8-for-10 at the foul line. Chaz Lanier scored five points while going 1-for-6.
Austin Peay (3-1) got 22 from Issac Haney and 20 points from LJ Thomas.
The Govs scored first on a Haney 3-pointer just 28 seconds into the game, but Tennessee answered with nine straight points and put the game away early with a 21-2 run, building a 52-29 at halftime.
Sunday’s game was the first in which Tennessee shot 70% or better in a half since January 2, 2023, when the Vols shot 76%, going 19-for-25, against Mississippi State.
Tennessee’s JP Estrella out with foot injury
Sophomore center JP Estrella did not play because of a foot injury. It’s the same foot injury that kept Estrella sidelined for much of the offseason and some of the preseason, as the Vols took caution trying to avoid surgery.
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Estrella, the 6-foot-11, 241-pounder from Scarborough, Maine, is averaging 4.7 points and 2.7 points rebounds in 10.0 minutes per game.
He had eight points and a rebound in nine minutes against Montana on Wednesday night. He played 10 minutes in the win at Louisville, scoring two points and grabbing five rebounds. He had four points and two rebounds in 11 minutes in the season-opening win over Gardner-Webb on November 4.
Estrella didn’t play during Tennessee’s exhibition loss against Indiana in Knoxville on October 27.
Tennessee vs. Virginia: Thursday, 9:30 p.m. ET, CBS Sports Network
Tennessee this week will travel to the Bahamas for the Baha Mar Championship, where the Vols will face Virginia in the opening round of the four-team tournament on Thursday. The game is scheduled for a 9:30 p.m. Eastern Time start on CBS Sports Network.
The other side of the bracket is No. 12 Baylor and No. 22 St. John’s, with the winners and losers from Thursday’s game playing Friday night.
Former Virginia coach Tony Bennett announced his retirement on October 18, a little less than three weeks away from the Cavaliers opening the season November 6. Interim head coach Ron Sanchez has UVA at 3-0 so far, with wins over Campell, Coppin State and Villanova.
