Tennessee celebrates well-earned SEC championship

Bruce Pearl led the Vols to an SEC regular-season title in his third year in Knoxville. AP

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GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- Even as he and his Tennessee teammates faced a double-digit deficit Wednesday, JaJuan Smith couldn't stop talking about championships. Almost every time the Volunteers huddled, Smith looked at the clock. He announced the minutes and added the words "to a championship."

"There was a countdown going on," Tennessee coach Bruce Pearl said.

It may sound like a little thing -- a regular-season conference title for the fourth-ranked team in the nation. After all, weren't the Vols supposed to do this? Of course they were. But down 13 at the half at a rowdy O'Connell Center to a Florida team playing for its NCAA tournament life, the Vols needed a reason to fight. At Alabama on Jan. 29, it was the knowledge that Tennessee had lost 17 of its past 18 trips to Coleman Coliseum. At Memphis on Feb. 23, it was the knowledge that a win would earn the Vols the first No. 1 ranking in school history.

Wednesday, the carrot Pearl dangled before his players was the school's first outright SEC regular-season title in 41 years. With that crown in mind, the Vols tightened their defense and kept chucking shots that would have gotten them benched if they played for any other coach. As usual, those shots fell, and Tennessee pulled out an 89-86 heartstopper.

So did the one-week (or more like 36-hour) stay atop the basketball world teach Tennessee any valuable lessons about the fickleness of fate or the need to be ever-vigilant against complacency? Is that how they managed to avoid an upset at home Saturday against Kentucky and another Wednesday in Gainesville? No, Pearl said.

"It didn't last long enough to learn anything from," he said. "[Losing the No. 1 ranking] had nothing to do with any of the outcomes. ... It makes for a good story, but it's not accurate."

Instead, Pearl suggested several reasons for Tennessee's resilience.

"What I'd like you to do, please, is focus on JaJuan Smith," Pearl said, so proud he looked as if he might burst through his orange suspenders. "Focus on Tyler Smith. Focus on Chris Lofton. Focus on Wayne Chism making the two free throws. Focus on those kids, because they had a will and a determination to win this championship here."

OK. Let's start with JaJuan Smith. A clerical error three minutes in gave him two fouls when he really had one and forced him to the bench. Tyler Smith actually committed one of the fouls, but when you start three players named Smith, these things happen. Smith could only watch as the Gators kept throwing haymakers. Florida, in danger of having its NCAA tournament streak snapped at nine, made its first nine shots. Officials corrected their mistake with 12:45 remaining and JaJuan Smith returned, but the Vols already trailed by nine.

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