Tennessee men’s basketball coach Rick Barnes spoke with the media after the Vols beat Radford 70-47 to improve to 2-0. Barnes broke down every part of the game, from the offensive struggles and improved defense to a team that is still learning to play together.

Below is everything Barnes had to say.

Where did the defensive effort and execution compare to where you want it to be?

“Well, I felt defensively, we’ve worked hard for a long time, but we’re starting to communicate better defensively. Radford is a good basketball team. The tape showed it. We showed our guys a lot. Like Wofford, a very well-coached team that’s going to run their stuff and do the things they need to do. But I thought defensively our communication was better. We knew again every type of team that wants to get to the rim or shoot threes. And I thought we had some really good individual plays tonight where they tried to isolate and get by us, and for the most part we did a pretty good job.

“Did a pretty good job not fouling overall, but offensively the execution is not even close to what I know we’re capable of. It looks like we’ve got too many guys that are too anxious to shoot the ball. I don’t think we’ve got a selfish guy on this team. I really don’t. I just think that we’ve got guys that have to understand that what we do works and we’ll make it work, but we just get a little too hyper, offensively.

“First four minutes of the game, everything that we told them, I actually watched it a little bit with them at halftime. I said, everything that we talk about is right here, but we don’t do it. We do it in practice, but we don’t do it when the lights come on, and that’s got to get better, obviously.

“Some of the shots that we shoot, and we want guys to take open shots, we want them to take the shots, but we missed some of them. The way we miss, we shouldn’t miss it, and I think that’s from being anxious, overly excited or whatever it may be. If we’ll play the game and do what we do, all that will fall in place. But I do want to see us continue to get better and better defensively. I think these guys really are starting to understand why we need to. A night like tonight, we were atrocious really on offense, but our defense was good.”

What leads to guys being anxious and pressing offensively?

“I think most guys that are anxious on offense, when the game’s over with, and this is most players, they look at the stat sheet and the only way they think they’ve had an impact is how many points they scored. I think that’s what it is, as opposed to thinking, did I turn it over? How many assists did I have? As a point guard, did I make the game easier for my teammates? And that’s not their fault. I think that’s where we are today. I think people think the only way they can impact a game is by scoring. I don’t think they look at it the way they need to and understand that we have a team where there’s really not much drop-off, which honestly, those are difficult teams to coach.

“But I just told them after the game, the one thing about it is if you get your minutes and you’re not productive, you can’t be upset when somebody else comes in and is getting the job done. So we got to get consistent, get productive. Again, we want to shoot the ball. We do. But the guards, two guys that I think really can handle the ball, Tyler had what, three turnovers or four? And Jalen Haralson had three of 16 turnovers. I don’t think those guys should turn the ball over. But I thought Miles responded. We didn’t start him today.

“And I’m going to tell you guys right now, we could start a different lineup every game because we’re going to base it on practice. Until we get the separation that we need, we’re going with whoever’s playing well. I told them we’re going to let the film and practice tell us who should be starting the game, and if that’s important to them, maybe they’ll get consistent. Yesterday, I did not think that Miles was into practice the way he needed to be. B Lue’s defense was there, and I knew tonight he’d be a little antsy starting his first game, and he shot an air ball to start the game. We’re still growing. We got a lot of growth.

“But I really do like this team. Like I said, I don’t think there’s a selfish guy on this team. I think there’s a bunch of guys that are going to have to rewire their DNA, and I know this. They want to win. They like each other. I don’t think they understand what goes into winning, but they’re getting closer, certainly on the defensive end. It’s our job as coaches to continue to teach, teach, teach and teach. And I do think you see some of them getting closer to it. But the exciting part is we know what we can be. We just got to get there.”

Is Juke Harris taking the right shots, even if they’re not going down?

“Yeah, when Juke’s open. And I think Juke should be one of the best mid-range players in the country. He’s big, he’s strong. But again, to start the game, both Juke and Terrence could have driven the ball maybe all the way to the basket. We got to drive it, get in there and make them stop you. If they don’t stop you, keep going. But yeah, I think guys just naturally pressed. I do. And I think it’s the fact that we really haven’t had a chance all year to put everything together because we haven’t gotten separation. One day this guy’s doing something well, the next day the other guy. We got to get consistency. But if we don’t get it.

“I know one thing. I don’t go in the game worrying about guards getting in foul trouble. I really don’t, because I thought Troy, other than his turnovers, is starting to understand the pace that we want to play with. And again, he’s working defensively. But again, some of the passes we’re making, some of the decisions we’re making just aren’t good decisions. There’s no way this team should turn the ball over the way we are. And I don’t think this team is a team that should ever look like the shots aren’t going anywhere when they leave their hands, because I think we got guys that can score, but they got to do it when the lights come on.”

You’ve been outrebounded in the first half of each of the first two games. Does that frustrate you, and what has led to it?

“Well, it depends. I look at tonight, they got offensive rebounds. But when you miss as many shots as they missed, they got a big opportunity to go get it, and some of those shots bounce off like that. But our depth was a factor tonight, and you could clearly see we got them worn down, which this team should do that for the most part. I thought when we got up and pressed, it helped us. We need to be able to do that more and be able to move and score.

“Again, I hadn’t looked at it that close, but our guards have got to rebound the ball. I don’t know where they came up with it, but our guards have to win that game every night. There’s so many games going on within the game. Our guards need to rebound, because our front line right now is not as physical as where we need it to be. So our guards have to rebound the ball for us.”

DeWayne Brown took three shots and grabbed 12 rebounds, and Troy Henderson took three shots with six assists. How would you assess their contributions in those other areas?

“I would say again, without seeing the film, I felt both of those guys tried to play the game the right way. I don’t think Troy was looking to shoot it. DeWayne, we need DeWayne to score more, but we’re going to get him the ball there. He’s got to score or get fouled. But both of those guys, again, DeWayne’s rebounding numbers were impressive. I’d like for him to get more touches.

“And that’s what I’m talking about. We ran some plays tonight, but again, our offense, we run one thing when we score and another thing when we miss. But our guards, if we don’t call it, they totally forget about our post guys. They forget about them. And at some point in time they have to understand those guys have to touch the basketball.”

What did you get from Miles Rubin on both ends tonight?

“Based on yesterday, we didn’t start him because he wasn’t very good in practice yesterday. And that might be the whole year. I told him, we’ll let the film tell us who’s going to start. If that’s important to you guys, if you want to be able to walk out when they call your name before the game, that’s fine. But he wasn’t very good in practice, and tonight I did think he came back and played. But it shouldn’t take that. He should want to understand it every day. It’s a chance to get better.

“We’ve got to continue to coach every one of these guys. But Miles has so much more left in his tank. He’s got to quit pacing himself. He’s got to learn to deal with cardio toughness, which I would say is for the majority of these guys right now. Not all of them, but the majority of them. When they get tired, they don’t know how to break through. They don’t know how to push themselves to the point of fatigue and know that if they get a loose ball, a deflection, something like that, they get 10 seconds and they’re ready to go again. And I think Miles and Jalen Haralson are guys that talk themselves into thinking they’re more tired than they really are.”

How hard is it to rewire these players’ DNA away from a scoring mentality and toward the winning elements?

“We want to have guys score. But you can ask them after the game, every one of these guys will tell you this is the best team they’ve ever played on. Some of these guys have never played on good teams with a lot of players that can play at the level that we’re going to have to compete at. Like I said, I know they want to do it, but believe it or not, they’ve come a long way. A long way already. But now we should be able to do what we’re asking them to do. Again, this team should never, ever have 17, 16 turnovers. Ever.

“But we’re throwing passes. I don’t know how many times we’re going to drive baseline and throw the ball to the corner when the guy in front of the basket is wide open or the drop man is wide open. We got to get our eyes open. We got to see the court. We just can’t put our head down and think, OK, I’m going to go. We got guys going to the rim that even if they had a layup, they don’t even realize it yet. And again, it goes back. I don’t think they’re selfish. I just think they got to understand those plays are there if they’ll play within themselves. And I don’t know how many times we got the ball stolen tonight, at least two where we threw that cross-court pass out front, and we’ve told them forever we can’t do that.

“But again, we like these guys. We just got to keep coaching them. They got to keep wanting to be coached. And the film will tell a lot. I think they see it, and I do think they try to correct it. I do. I think they’re trying to fix it.”

Is there an update on Jalen Washington’s eligibility filing in Indiana?

“We understand they were filing there, here in the next day or so is what we understand.”

What did you see on film or in practice that made you comfortable putting Juke and Terrence in the lineup?

“Practice. Like we asked, get out there, get out beyond the 3-point line and guard. If Terrence Hill would play in the games the way he practiced yesterday, believe me, he was terrific. He didn’t do any of that today at the level he needed to. Again, he started the game, you think about it, he threw the ball directly out of bounds at Braedan’s feet. Just through it at his feet. Can’t catch that. One, he had a lob. B. Lue should have cut, he would have had a dunk. He had a layup, and the worst possible decision he could make was to throw the ball at somebody’s feet. He’s too good a player to do that.

“But he was terrific yesterday in practice. Like I told you, we looked at the film and saw it last night, and when I got to watch them practice, I thought this was the group we were going with because I thought they were the ones that really paid attention to what we were asking them to do.”

What’s the bigger challenge for these guys right now, learning to play together or learning to play in your system?

“Learning to play together and just again, not be so anxious. Let it work. Again, we’ve actually the last two days we had great execution days. But it’s one thing to play against yourselves and another to come out and do it. Everything that we practiced was there in the first four minutes. We just didn’t execute it. It was all there. We just didn’t take advantage of it.”

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