By Jimmy Hyams

Last season, the Tennessee men’s basketball team went 16-16, stumbled down the stretch and didn’t even qualify for the NIT.

That wasn’t acceptable to Rick Barnes, who had just finished his second season on Rocky Top.

So on the Monday after being eliminated from the SEC Tournament, the returning players were back in the gym and in the weight room, working out.

“Coach (Barnes) has a tremendous capacity to push people,’’ said UT associate head coach Rob Lanier.

And push, Barnes did.

He pushed them all the way to the school’s seventh SEC regular-season championship after media picked the Vols 13^th in a 14 team league.

He pushed them to be tougher, to work harder, to play together, to play defense, to improve daily, to max out.

For the most part, Tennessee did those things.

But one of those criteria stood above all others.

After one of those grueling workouts, Lanier posed a question to the team: If you polled every player in the SEC and asked who was the hardest playing and most competitive team in the league, who would it be?

All Tennessee players named the same team.

“And it wasn’t us,’’ Lanier said.

Lanier didn’t divulge the team, but it was obviously South Carolina, which swept the Vols and advanced to the Final Four for the first time.

“Our message to them at the time,’’ Lanier said, “was that if your peers are not answering `Tennessee’ when asked that question, then you are not being true to whatever aspirations you say you have as a competitor in this program and in this league.

“So that has to change.’’

It did – dramatically.

Tennessee was the tougher when it beat Purdue and NC State and Iowa State and Texas A&M and Florida and South Carolina twice and Kentucky twice. And against Georgia in the SEC title-clinching game in Knoxville on Saturday.

Barnes wanted UT to set a “whole new standard,’’ and not just be like a South Carolina, according to Lanier.

“We don’t want to compare ourselves to anyone,’’ Lanier said. “We want for people who either turn on the TV or sit in the stands, for them to say, `Wow, these guys really play with passion and effort and competitiveness and class.’

“We continue to strive for that.’’

Lanier said there were four times in which UT wasn’t the tougher team: in losses to Villanova, Auburn, Alabama and Georgia in Athens. He could have added North Carolina.

Against Villanova, Tennessee led by 15 during the first half before the Wildcats rallied for an 85-76 victory, outscoring the Vols 51-30 in the second half.

Before the second half started, a Villanova player sent a message to UT’s players.

“One of their players barks out toward our players, `It’s about to be a street fight here,’’’ Lanier recalled of the game played in the Bahamas.

“Out guys heard it. They acted tough. `Bring it on.’ But they (UT players) weren’t ready for what was getting to happen.’’

Lanier described Villanova as a team with a “championship culture’’ that had a “frame of reference for what it’s like to take it to another level.

“When we left the gym, we knew there was a different level we could reach.’’

Against Auburn, UT jumped out to a double-digit lead in the first half before the Tigers stormed back to take a 10-point win in Knoxville. Auburn scored 52 second-half points.

“They were just better,’’ Lanier conceded. “Every loose ball, every big shot at different points during the game, very big play that needed to be made, they did it.’’

Tennessee had entered SEC play ranked in the top 25. Now the Vols were 0-2 in the league.

“They went from being overconfident to sort of doubting themselves that night,’’ Lanier said.

The team agreed to focus on the next practice, the next day, the next game and don’t look at the long-term ramifications of being 0-2 in the SEC. It worked.

But there were still bumps in the road.

Alabama crushed Tennessee 78-50 on Feb. 10.

Lanier recalls that on the first play of the game, there as a loose ball. Three Alabama players jumped on the ball. UT players watched.

Lanier called the outcome an “aberration.’’

Then came the loss at Georgia one week later – the Bulldogs fifth win in a row over UT.

“After the game, we felt like they were the tougher team,’’ Lanier said.

But that wasn’t the case Saturday. UT gutted out a win over the Bulldogs despite shooting just 38.9 percent from the field and being outrebounded 38-28.

But UT found enough resolve, enough toughness to escape with the win and cut down the championship nets.

And prove the preseason prognosticators wrong.

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