WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — No. 18/16 Tennessee (9-0) will take on a highly-regarded Richmond squad (9-2) on Friday at 2:15 p.m. ET in the Lady Vols’ opening game of the West Palm Beach Classic.
The teams will meet at Rubin Arena on the campus of Palm Beach Atlantic University in a contest that can be heard on 95.5FM WSMG beginning at 1:45pm.
UT played at Memphis on Wednesday night and arrived at its hotel in West Palm Beach at 3 a.m. on Thursday. The Lady Vols are navigating a schedule that includes three games over four days in two different time zones before they get a brief break for the holidays. UR’s most recent contest was last Sunday at home vs. Texas.
The Big Orange will attempt to start the year 10-0 for only the third time in the past 13 seasons and join the 2017-18 (15-0) and 2013-14 (10-0) post-Pat Summitt era UT squads in opening their campaigns that way. If they are successful, it would mark only the 13th time in program history a Lady Vol squad won its first 10.
Kim Caldwell‘s team enters the match-up ranked No. 1 nationally in six statistical categories after winning at Memphis on Wednesday night, 90-75, at FedExForum, home of the NBA’s Grizzlies. UT is tops in the NCAA in scoring offense (97.4), three pointers per game (12.9), three-point attempts per game (39.8), offensive rebounds per game (21.9), turnovers forced per game (28.78) and winning percentage (100.0). It is second in steals per game (16.1) and turnover margin (14.0).
Richmond has lost two of its last three after winning its first eight, but those losses were to Georgetown, 55-53, and No. 6 Texas, 65-54. The Spiders also suffered a narrow loss to Oklahoma State, 57-53, on Nov. 30.
This will mark the second all-time meeting between these programs, with UT leading 1-0 in the series after defeating UR, 80-54, in Knoxville on Jan. 14, 1991. Tennessee senior Samara Spencer and Richmond redshirt junior Jada Green are both products of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and St. Thomas Aquinas High School, getting to play a game close to home this weekend.
