University of Tennessee Athletics
Georgia-Tennessee Postgame Quotes
February 11, 2009 | Men's Basketball
Feb. 11, 2009
Recap | Box Score | Photo Gallery 
Tennessee Head Coach Bruce Pearl: Tennessee Head Coach Bruce Pearl: "It is tough to see Georgia go through such tough times. It is what happens when they have a coaching change in mid-season. Pete Herrmann is doing the best he can do. I just hope they hang in there.
"We did a much better job on the boards than we did against Auburn. We got 27 defensive rebounds while Georgia was only getting 9 offensive rebounds, so that was a great deal of improvement there. We had some terrific numbers by some of our players, and there is a lot of positive stuff we could talk about.
"Our crowd gave a tremendous reception for Ryan Childress' first appearance. We are third in the nation in attendance, and only 85 fans per game short of what North Carolina has done. It will be exciting Saturday when the all-time Tennessee team is honored.
"We are OK as far as the SEC race is concerned. We are tied for first in the loss column, but our future schedule does not favor us. I know we could lose all of our remaining games, or we could win them all.
"Bobby Maze did a good job in keeping Dustin Ware in front of him. Georgia could not get the ball in the paint. It was good to see us play that way, and I would like to see it continue. We were ready to play tonight, but we have some issues, though. We have some real weaknesses, defensively that we either try to hide or to disguise.
"Tyler Smith has been sick the past few days - he toughed it out awfully well tonight, though. Brian Williams brought some good energy and aggressiveness to the game."
Georgia Interim Head Coach Pete Herrmann: "We did the same thing Saturday night at South Carolina, and we were determined to get off a little better tonight. We did not do that. We met a team that was determined to be better defensively after losing their last game, and we did not respond like we needed to. We really were not responsive throughout the whole first half.
"I thought Tennessee moved the ball well, shared the ball, and was very aggressive off the glass.
"Turnovers have been a problem for us all year. We have tried to correct that, and to work on that, but we have not been successful. We have just got to continue to stay together; the only people we have are this team and these coaches, and we need to pull together and win a game."
Postgame Notes
- Tennessee had a season-high 12 players score in the win.
- Junior Ryan Childress made his season debut after sustaining a knee injury during the offseason. Childress scored two points and grabbed three rebounds.
- J.P. Prince's nine rebounds were a career high.
- Wayne Chism's five assists tied a career high previously set vs. Auburn (Feb. 20, 2008).
- Tennessee's nine turnovers tied for the second fewest in a game this season. The Vols coughed it up eight times vs. Belmont (Dec. 20) and Kentucky (Jan. 13). The Vols' assist-to-turnover ratio of 2.7-to-1 was their best of the season.
- UT's bench outscored Georgia's bench 22-16 in the game. Tennessee's bench has outscored the opponent's bench in 21 of 23 games this season.
- The 31-point margin of victory was Tennessee's second largest SEC win since 2000. The Vols beat South Carolina by 33 in last season's home finale (March 9, 2008). Prior to that, UT beat Auburn by 38 (98-60, Jan. 15, 2000).
