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ANN ARBOR, Mich. — No. 7 NC State ended 10th-seeded Tennessee’s season in the first round of the women’s NCAA tournament Friday night, 76-61, as the Lady Vols closed the year with the school’s first eight-game losing streak in the modern era.
For the first time since the NCAA tournament was created in 1982, the Lady Vols went winless in March. Their last victory was Feb. 12 against Missouri.
“I can’t put it on roster construction. I gotta put it on me, right? I’ve always been able to recruit players … and get them to run through a wall for me and get them to play hard,” mentioned second-year Tennessee coach Kim Caldwell. “I wasn’t able to do that, and the one thing I can put my finger on is that I bailed on what we want to do first, and then how can I blame anyone else from doing it?”
Caldwell mentioned nothing about Friday’s game went according to plan. Tennessee seemed flat at the start and NC State took advantage — making its first eight shots and going on a 15-0 run to take a 19-4 lead, at which point Caldwell couldn’t revive her team the way she wanted. The Lady Vols clawed back to within 48-46 late in the third quarter but that was as close as they could get the rest of the way.
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Tennessee — which has played in every NCAA tournament — had only been knocked out twice previously in the first game of the tourney — in 2009 by Ball State and in 2019 by UCLA.
“It was the worst year of my professional career,” Caldwell mentioned. “Our players deserve better than that from me, and you learn from that going forward.
“There was never clear leadership on my part of hey, this is exactly what we’re going to do. This is why we’re going to do it. We never got consistent rotations.”
Tennessee, which lost to Texas in the Sweet 16 a year ago, entered this year’s tournament with a 16-13 overall record and 8-8 mark in SEC play.
Struggling outside the paint, the Lady Vols were 7-of-36 on 3-pointers Friday night. In the second quarter, when NC State switched to a zone defense, Tennessee’s offense averaged 0.5 points per possession and missed all 13 of its 3-point attempts.
Tennessee shot 33% from the field overall and attempted six free throws, tied for the program’s second fewest in the NCAA tournament.
The loss was Tennessee’s seventh by 15 points or more this season — its most in 40 years.
“There have been very few times that I have hit failure, and I’ve never hit failure to this extreme,” mentioned the 36-year-old Caldwell, who previously coached at Marshall and led her alma mater, Glenville State, to the 2022 Division II national title. “It’s a tough place to do it, publicly, and I didn’t like who I was at certain times.”
Tennessee coach Kim Caldwell walks off the court following Friday’s first-round loss to NC State. “It was the worst year of my professional career,” Caldwell mentioned. “Our players deserve better than that from me, and you learn from that going forward.” Al Goldis/APPlayers, some with tears in their eyes, expressed their disappointment of how the year ended.”Of course it sucks to lose any game, but this game our season is over and it sucks even more,” mentioned Tennessee junior forward Alyssa Latham. “We tried our best today to extend our season but it didn’t go the way we wanted to.”
Tennessee senior Talaysia Cooper, who scored 24 points, mentioned, “I feel like we played hard this game. You win some, you lose some. It happens.”
Cooper, who will be eligible for the 2026 WNBA draft, mentioned she isn’t thinking about her future at this time.
“I’m just thinking about the game we just played and spending time with my teammates,” she mentioned.
Pat Summitt, who won eight NCAA championships with the Lady Vols, had 23 seasons with six or less losses. This year’s team equaled the most defeats since the 2015-16 season and had the fewest wins for an at-large team since 2018, which led to Tennessee’s worst seeding since 2019.
The Wolfpack advanced for the eighth time in their last nine NCAA tournaments and will play second-seeded Michigan on the Wolverines’ home court in the second round Sunday.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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