Tennessee Basketball's history as the No. 1 team in the rankings
Tennessee Basketball couldn’t have written a better script. The Vols were ranked No. 2 and were going on the road to face No. 1 Memphis at FedEx Forum.
ESPN’s College GameDay was on location for the Saturday night rivalry game between the two best teams in college basketball. It was a late-season showdown like few others.
And Tennessee was up for the challenge. Tyler Smith scored 16 points, Wayne Chism had 13 and JP Prince scored 13 of his own off the bench in a 66-62 win.
More importantly, the Vols left with the No. 1 ranking. If only for a moment.
Tennessee was ranked No. 1 two days later, then lost 72-69 at Vanderbilt the following night. The program’s first No. 1 ranking lasted exactly one week.
But Rick Barnes has rewritten that history. First in 2019 and again on Monday, when the Vols were back at No. 1 in the rankings after chaos at the top of the polls last week.
Kansas, last week’s No. 1, lost at Creighton. No. 2 Auburn lost at Duke, No. 4 Kentucky lost at Clemson and No. 5 Iowa State lost at Marquette.
That opened the door for Tennessee (8-0) — off to the best start in the 10-year Barnes era and the best for the program since the 2000-01 team started 9-0 — to jump up from No. 3 to No. 1.
Tennessee spent four weeks ranked No. 1 in 2019
Tennessee’s second time at No. 1 lasted longer five years ago, but started with an all-too-similar scene.
The Vols went to Vanderbilt as the new No. 1, trailed by four with two minutes left in regulation and had to rally to force overtime.
Top 10
- 1Live
SEC Football Schedule
Week by week schedule revealed
- 2
Rich Rodriguez
WVU expected to hire former HC
- 3New
Belichick contract
Details out on UNC deal
- 4
Garrett Nussmeier
LSU QB announces 2025 return
- 5
Bill Belichick
UNC finalizing deal with legend
They survived with an 88-83 win thanks to a career-high 43 points from Grant Williams, who went a perfect 23-for-23 at the foul line.
From there, Tennessee would spend the next four weeks ranked No. 1 and would win seven games as the top-ranked team, returning home to beat West Virginia before wins at South Carolina and at Texas A&M, then home games against Missouri, Florida and South Carolina.
A program-record 19-game win streak and the run at No. 1 ended with an 86-69 loss at No. 5 Kentucky on February 16, three weeks after the Vols went to the top of the polls.
Vols have been ranked in the top five 16 times dating back to 2020-21
This time Tennessee takes its No. 1 ranking to New York City where the Vols will face Miami in the Jimmy V Classic on Tuesday at Madison Square Garden in a 6:30 p.m. Eastern Time start on ESPN.
Tennessee goes to Illinois on Saturday for another marquee non-conference game and the second game of a home-and-home that started with a win in Knoxville last December.
However long this run lasts, the poll numbers speak for themselves during the Barnes era.
The Vols have been ranked for 65 straight times, nearly doubling the previous program record of 37. They have been ranked in the top ten 35 times during the current run and in the top five 15 times.
