Tennessee Lady Vols basketball gives up 16 3-pointers in 17-point loss to UCLA

UCLA put the Tennessee Lady Vols on their heels from the start of the Battle 4 Atlantis semifinal and they never recovered.

The Bruins (5-0) scored 26 points in the first quarter on red-hot shooting from behind the arc and didn't let up all game to win 80-63 against the No. 12 Lady Vols (2-3) on Sunday at Paradise Island, Bahamas.

"We were chasing all night," Lady Vols forward Rickea Jackson said. "When you playing catch-up against good teams like this, we have to know to be disciplined and not get outrebounded and take care of the ball."

Just when it appeared Tennessee was turning a corner after winning the tournament opener against Rutgers on Saturday, bad habits doomed it from the start. The Lady Vols got outrebounded, were late to close out on the perimeter and couldn't pull themselves out of the offensive rut they fell into.

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UCLA had four players scoring in double-figures. Senior Charisma Osborne scored a game-high 23 points along with six rebounds and three assists.

Jackson led Tennessee in scoring with 14 points and three rebounds. The senior capitalized on her trips to the free throw line, hitting 10 of 12 attempts.

UCLA makes Tennessee pay from behind the arc

The Bruins were shooting 23.7% from three going into Sunday's matchup. In the first half alone, UCLA hit 10-of-17 from behind the arc with Osborne hitting three of her six attempts.

Osborne and Wake Forest graduate transfer Gina Conti were higher-percentage 3-point shooters last season and hit their stride against Tennessee, combining for nine. Londynn Jones was a perfect 3-for-3.

The Lady Vols were late to close-outs or losing shooters on defense to give up open 3-pointers, and some of the misses were wide-open chances for UCLA.

That trend held in the second half and UCLA made a total of 16 3-pointers on 53.3% shooting.

"That's tough for us to see that," Lady Vols coach Kellie Harper said of the high 3-point percentage. "But obviously, you hope that your defense can affect that percentage a little bit. We just weren't able to do it."

Bruins bully Lady Vols on the boards

Tennessee showed it's capable of dominating the boards against Rutgers. Then it slid back into its rebounding slump from the first three games of the season.

UCLA outrebounded Tennessee 20-12 in the first two quarters. When the Lady Vols kept up with the Bruins in the second quarter, grabbing seven rebounds to their eight, they only got outscored 20-18.

Marta Suárez's four rebounds was a team-high for the Lady Vols. Tennessee wasn't able to close the gap in the second half and got outrebounded 41-30.

UCLA defense locks up Lady Vols

The Bruins didn't give Tennessee anything easy on the offensive end.

The Lady Vols were held to 11 points in the third quarter on 15.4% shooting. It didn't help that they didn't get many transition opportunities, only scoring nine points on fast breaks compared to their 25 points in transition against Rutgers.

Finishing at the rim was an issue in the third quarter – UT only made 10 of its 26 layup attempts.

"Honestly, we was getting good looks for the most part," UT guard Jordan Horston said. "When we'd go to the basket, they wasn't really able to stay in front of us, but we just wasn't finishing. I feel like we was going in looking for a foul and not really going in looking to finish, and it ended up hurting us."

Jackson echoed Horston, and said the plays they didn't finish or get a foul on deflated them in the third quarter.

"We'll get a steal and we'll come down and miss a layup or something like that," Jackson said. "So it really killed our energy."

Tennessee ended up shooting 38.5% from the field and only made 3-of-10 3-pointers.

Jasmine Powell, who had eight assists against Rutgers, played only 20 minutes. Tennessee only had seven assists overall against UCLA.

Tennessee fails to establish strong post presence

The Lady Vols had 34 points in the paint, but that wasn't from their posts.

The game was physical and UCLA's defense was stifling at times. Tennessee's post players weren't able to establish a strong presence to produce offensively.

Senior Tamari Key had four points, three rebounds and three blocks in her 18 minutes played. Jasmine Franklin had four points and three rebounds in 15 minutes and Jillian Hollingshead had four points in 10 minutes.

"When you're watching some of these players out here in this tournament, and you see 'em posting up – you're very confident that they want the basketball," Harper said. "We have to have the same effort from our post players, and then we've got to be able to look for 'em. I think if you demand the ball there you'll get it. But we'll help them out schematically with some things."

Up next

Tennessee will play in the third-place game on Monday (2:30 p.m. ET, ESPNU) against Gonzaga (4-1).

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Tennessee Lady Vols allow 16 3-pointers in 80-63 loss to UCLA