The Tennessee Volunteers are still dancing. Rick Barnes and company handled Creighton on Friday night, disposing of the Bluejays, 82-75. Dalton Knecht led the way with 24 points.
Tennessee and Creighton traded baskets in an uptempo first half, with neither side able to gain an advantage. The Bluejays would eventually go ahead 33-29 after finding their stroke from three, but a Tennessee run — which included a three from Cameron Carr of all people — would give the Volunteers the lead back just before halftime.
Creighton’s Steven Ashworth was a problem early on, connecting on shot after shot to keep Creighton in the game.
We knew Tennessee would have to make shots to keep pace with Creighton’s offense, and that’s exactly what the Vols were able to do. We also knew Dalton Knecht would need some help, and that’s exactly what he got, even with Santiago Vescovi sidelined due to the flu.
Josiah-Jordan James returned to form and knocked down a couple of open three-pointers. Zakai Zeigler found his shooting stroke again to take some pressure off of Knecht.
All of that added up to an avalanche to open the second half. A Zeigler three, a James jumper, Knecht attacking the paint, another Zeigler three — very quickly Tennessee had a 55-39 lead on Creighton, suddenly in total control of what was a tight ballgame.
Creighton would inch back, however. Baylor Scheierman would get rolling to pull the Bluejays back to within three points with just six minutes to play.
A Dalton Knecht three would stop the bleeding for Tennessee. The All-American drained a jumped over Scheierman to pad the Vols’ lead in a key spot. That seemed to be the backbreaker for Creighton.
The Bluejays didn’t have any answers down the stretch, and Tennessee would hit their free throws at the end to salt this one away.
Final Score: Tennessee 82, Creighton 75.
Knecht finished with 26 points. Zeigler poured in 18 while James provided a big 15 points. The Vols shot 45 percent from three-point range, which was a far cry from the debacle we saw against Texas. That was clearly the difference tonight, especially with Creighton hitting on 47 percent of their long range shots.
“I really thought both teams played their hearts out, played really hard is what you would expect obviously this time of year. The stuff that Coach McDermott does with his team, they’re an extremely, extremely hard team to guard.
“Really proud of the effort defensively. Again, they do a lot of things that are really difficult. Also, we made a run, and this time of year you expect them to make a run, which they did. But really proud of the way our guys stayed with each other, did what we had to do.”
Tennessee moves on to face Purdue in the Elite Eight. Tip-off from Detroit is set for 2:20 ET on CBS.