How a 'baffled' Rick Barnes picked up the pieces after Tennessee's loss at North Carolina

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — Rick Barnes was baffled by what he was seeing Wednesday night against No. 17 North Carolina. So much so that he came out and said it during his postgame press conference.

Then he said it again. Then he said it a third time.

No. 10 Tennessee giving up 61 points in one half? The same Vols that allowed only 57.9 points per game last season? Leaving shooters open on the 3-point line? Unable to stop drives to the rim or defend the rim itself? Down 24 points less than three minutes into the second half?

“It’s just, to be honest, I was baffled, to be quite frank with you,” Barnes said after the 100-92 loss in the ACC-SEC Challenge at the Dean Smith Center.

“It was just our mindset to start the game,” Barnes added later. “I’m still baffled by it to be quite honest. It came out of nowhere and it was like, who are these guys that we are sitting here coaching? Because we haven’t been like that —  I’m serious. I don’t think I’ve had a team look like that in nine years.” 

“Of all the games we’ve played, this 20 minutes, again, I’m baffled, to be honest with you,” Barnes said one final time.

Barnes benched fifth-year senior guard Santiago Vescovi, scoreless in his 14 minutes on the floor, for most of the second half. He blamed it on a lack of consistency and perhaps too much complacency.

“I mean, I just told the team that the one thing that I’m really, really guilty of is complacency,” Barnes said. “I can’t stand it. I don’t care who it is. And, to be honest with you, (if) we hadn’t got back the game he wouldn’t have played. I don’t care who it is. 

“I’ve been like that my whole career. I think it’s a privilege to play this game. And, again, we can’t score 92 points and him not have a point. I mean, we gotta know what we’re gonna get.”

‘The worst basketball half (from a) team I’ve ever coached’

He benched freshman forward JP Estrella — despite junior center Jonas Aidoo battling foul trouble and sophomore power forward Tobe Awaka out with an ankle injury — for not getting back in transition defense. 

“We spend every day working on transition defense,” Barnes said. “Every day. Every day we do it, but we specifically did it with North Carolina. We know they like to run and we know they like to pass ahead. So when that happens, you gotta kind of extend your transition out a little bit. 

“And we worked two days, nothing but kicking out our point guard to get back down there. And again, he’s young but those mistakes can’t happen, especially when that’s his sole thing that we’re asking him to do in the game. To get back in transition and do that job.”

And he called the first half what it was, in his opinion: An all-time low for his coaching career.

“I told our team at halftime,” Barnes said, “it’s the worst basketball half (from a) team I’ve ever coached. Never seen a team that has the ability that we have that can be that bad in the first half.” 

How Tennessee can build on the second half at North Carolina

Then, after exhausting all the shortcomings, Barnes shifted gears. He started finding some positives.

After all, the same team that gave up the 61 points in the first half answered a 24-point deficit in the second half with a 22-6 run, cutting Carolina’s lead down to eight.  It was all the way down to six with 1:39 left, as close as the Vols would get, after two Aidoo free throws.

Dalton Knecht scored 37 points — tying a record for an opposing player in the Dean Smith Center, matching La Salle’s Lionel Simmons in 1988 — before leaving the game with a left ankle injury in the closing minutes. 

“We were playing a little pitch-and-get game with him,” Barnes said. “He made some really good plays.”

Josiah-Jordan James scored 20 points on 8-for-11 shooting and was the one player who Barnes said was ready to play from start to finish. 

“(He’s) been in these games,” Barnes said, “and knew and acted like he’d been in the games like this.”

Zakai Zeigler scored nine points and finally started to look like his old self.

“I thought he got back to being where we wanted him to be,” Barnes said.

Freshman forward Cade Phillips was fearless in his limited minutes, too.

“I can’t say enough about Cade,” Barnes said. “I mean he’s got so much respect from his teammates because the one thing they know he’s going to do is go in and battle.”

Aidoo, the Durham, N.C., native, scored 13 points and had four rebounds. He drew maybe the most significant praise from the head coach despite once again battling foul trouble, picking up two early whistles in the first half then fouling out after 21 minutes on the floor. 

“We’re going to establish Jonas,” Barnes said. “And I truly think Jonas is gonna play his way this year to being one of the best post guys in the country.”

When asked if he was more discouraged by the first half or encouraged by the second half, Barnes answered emphatically. 

“We’re good,” he said. “We’re a good team.”

That’s the team that won at Michigan State a month ago, won at Wisconsin two weeks ago and battled the top two teams in the country, Kanas and Purdue, last week in the Maui Invitational. 

Even if that team didn’t show up for the first 23 minutes at North Carolina.

“I’ve always said you can’t win big games unless you get in them,” Barnes said. “But I also will tell you this: I just want to be there in March.”