KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – The University of Tennessee men’s basketball team concluded the 2024-25 regular season by defeating South Carolina, 75-65, Saturday afternoon at a sold-out Food City Center.
On a day it honored seven seniors, fourth-ranked Tennessee (25-6, 12-6 SEC) got a game-high 23 points from one of them, fifth-year guard Chaz Lanier, who had 20 after the break. The triumph sealed the program’s fourth consecutive 25-win campaign and third-ever 25-win regular season.
The Volunteers—behind eight points from senior forward Igor Miličić Jr., to give him 1,000 as a collegian—raced out to a 10-4 lead after just 4:34 of action. The home team, buoyed by seven assists from senior guard Zakai Zeigler on its first eight makes in the opening eight minutes, stretched the margin to 10, 23-13, with 8:43 left in the session.
South Carolina (12-19, 2-16 SEC) answered with a 15-4 burst, including notching seven straight points in 97 seconds, to grab its first lead, 28-27, with 2:09 left before the break. The Gamecocks extended the run to 21-8, making it 34-31 with 20 seconds on the first-half timer. An ensuing three-point play by Tennessee sophomore forward Cade Phillips leveled the score at 34 through 20 minutes.
Senior guard Jamarii Thomas scored 14 points in the opening stanza for South Carolina, shooting 3-of-7 beyond the arc to go along with a 3-of-3 free-throw ledger that came from drawing a foul on another 3-point attempt. The Volunteers started 10-of-16 from the floor and then went 3-of-10 the rest of the half, while the Gamecocks began 3-of-15 and shot 7-of-13 from then on. In addition, Tennessee was 4-of-9 from the line after missing its first five attempts, while South Carolina went 9-of-10.
A three-point play by Miličić put the Volunteers ahead, 39-38, just 3:44 into the second stanza. That initiated a 12-4 spurt—it concluded with seven straight points in 84 ticks—to put the Volunteers up by six, 48-42, with 12:57 remaining.
Shortly thereafter, Lanier hit back-to-back long-range shots in 43 seconds, sparking a 14-5 run in which he scored the first nine points, to make it a game-best 12-point advantage, 64-52, with 7:56 to go. The stretch came during an 8-of-10 field-goal span for the Volunteers that featured six consecutive makes.
The Gamecocks got it down to eight, 64-56, with 6:51 to go, but Tennessee soon answered by scoring four fast-break points in 21 seconds to again go up a dozen, 68-56, just 99 ticks later.
South Carolina made it 72-65 in the final minute, but the Volunteers scored the final three points to earn their 18th double-digit triumph of 2024-25.
In the final 16 minutes of the game, Lanier scored 20 points on 8-of-11 field-goal shooting. It marked his third 20-point half of the season, including his first after the intermission. The Nashville, Tenn., native added four rebounds, three assists and a game-leading three steals.
Phillips scored a career-best 15 points and matched a career high with six made field goals, finishing 6-of-8 from the floor. He pulled down four rebounds and paced all players with three blocked shots.
Miličić finished with 13 points and five rebounds, while senior guard Jordan Gainey had 10 points and a career-high-tying six assists. Zeigler and fellow senior guard Jahmai Mashack, who won for the 60th time in 65 home outings, led the team in assists (eight) and rebounds (seven), respectively.
Thomas paced the Gamecocks with 20 points, but Tennessee ultimately held him to a 5-of-15 field-goal clip. Graduate forward Nick Pringle amassed 16 points and a game-high 14 rebounds, while junior guard Zachary Davis had 10 points. The Volunteers limited the Gamecocks’ leading scorer and rebounder, sophomore forward Collin Murray-Boyles, to seven points and three boards on 3-of-7 shooting.
Tennessee shot 54.5 percent (30-of-55) from the floor, while the visitors posted just a 35.1 percent (20-of-57) ledger at the other end. The Gamecocks, though, opened 13-of-14 from the line and finished 17-of-22 (77.3 percent). In addition, the victors amassed a 42-24 advantage in paint points and did not concede a single fast-break point.
The Volunteers enter the postseason as the fourth seed in the SEC Tournament, where they will begin play Friday at 3:30 p.m. ET against a to-be-determined opponent at Bridgestone Arena.
To keep up with the University of Tennessee men’s basketball team on social media, follow @Vol_Hoops on Instagram and X/Twitter, as well as /tennesseebasketball on Facebook.
TENNESSEE VOLUNTEERS POSTGAME NOTES
• Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes upped his career win total to 831, tying John Calipari and Cliff Ellis for ninth place on the all-time wins list (min. 10 years in Division I).
• Barnes and Calipari are also now yet again tied for the most victories of any active coach at the Division I level.
• With his 112th SEC victory, Barnes matched Hank Crisp for the No. 18 position on the all-time SEC-only wins list.
• Tennessee recognized seven seniors after the game: guard Darlinstone Dubar, guard Jordan Gainey, guard Grant Hurst, guard Chaz Lanier, guard Jahmai Mashack, forward Igor Miličić Jr., and guard Zakai Zeigler.
• Mashack and Zeigler, the Volunteers’ two four-year players, finished their career 60-5 (.923) in home games at Food City Center.
• At halftime, Tennessee also honored their radio crew of Bob Kesling and Bert Bertelkamp, who called their final home game after 26 years together on the Vol Network.
• The Volunteers, who logged their 21st sellout in the last three years (2022-25) and eighth of 2024-25, are now 38-15 all-time in Food City Center sellouts, including 37-13 since the 2007-08 capacity reduction and 27-7 in Barnes’ 10-year tenure.
• The eight Food City Center sellouts in 2024-25 tied the arena single-season record, set just one year ago in 2023-24.
• Tennessee improved to 96-34 all-time when playing in front of 20,000-plus fans at Food City Center, including 37-10 under Barnes, with 32 of the latter 47 over the past four seasons (2021-25).
• Saturday’s crowd marked the 12th time in 2024-25, all in the Volunteers’ past 13 outings, over 19,000 fans have been in attendance at Food City Center.
• Tennessee improved to 12-2 in its last 14 matchups with South Carolina—that dates to Jan. 20, 2018—and own an 11-1 record while ranked in that stretch.
• The Volunteers are now 7-1 in their last eight games versus the Gamecocks, with six wins by 10-plus, five by 20-plus and two by 40-plus, owning an average margin of victory of 23.4 points per game in the seven triumphs.
• This is just the fourth time since South Carolina joined the SEC in 1991-92 the two schools did not meet multiple times in the regular season, joining 2020-21 (one game canceled due to COVID-19), 2013-14 and 2012-13.
• Saturday’s season finale marked the first time Tennessee played a sub-.500 foe in SEC play since Feb. 20, 2024, at Missouri, snapping a 22-game conference streak of facing opponents .500 or better.
• The Volunteers are one of just five Division I teams to win 25-plus games in each of the last four seasons, alongside Drake, Duke, Houston and Saint Mary’s, while just three others (Arizona, Gonzaga and Purdue) can still join that group.
• Tennessee has reached the 25-win mark for the ninth time ever, including the sixth under Rick (all in the last eight years) and the fourth in a row.
• This is the third time the Volunteers have ever recorded at least 25 victories in the regular season, joining a 27-4 mark in 2018-19, also in the Barnes era, and a 28-3 count in 2007-08.
• Tennessee has 12-plus SEC wins in (at least) two consecutive seasons for the fourth time ever, including the second under Barnes, joining a two-year stretch from 2017-18 to 2018-19, a seven-year streak from 1970-71 to 1976-77 and a three-year tally from 1966-67 to 1968-69.
• Junior forward Felix Okpara (18:20) and Zeigler (18:05) both picked up their third foul within the first two minutes of the second half and Okpara eventually fouled out in just 17 minutes of action.
• Saturday marked the first time in 2024-25 the Volunteers entered the halftime intermission tied and just their 14th time (7-7) doing so in Barnes’ 10-year tenure.
• Tennessee has conceded 35 or fewer first-half points in 26 of its 31 contests thus far, including 29 or fewer on 15 occasions and 23 or fewer eight times.
• Eighteen of Tennessee’s 25 wins are by double digits, with 17 by 12-plus points, nine by at least 20, four by at least 35 and two by 40-plus.
• Zeigler’s eight assists upped his season mark to 224, surpassing his own tally of 218 last year and Johnny Darden’s 221 figure in 1976-77, jumping from fourth to second on the program’s single-season leaderboard.
• The eight assists for Zeigler to give him 224 moved him from No. 19 all the way to No. 12 on the SEC’s single-season list.
• Zeigler and Mashack improved to 104-34 (.754) in their career, matching Quinn Cannington and Wayne Chism, who went 104-38 (.732) from 2006-10, for the most victories by a four-year player in Tennessee history.
• Lanier’s 20-point half was the fourth by a Volunteer in 2024-25, including his third, with his prior two—25 against Baylor on Nov. 22, 2024, in Nassau, Bahamas, and 22 versus Texas A&M on Feb. 22—both before the break.
• Lanier registered the 27th 20-points performance of his career, including the 12th of his lone campaign as a Volunter.
• Miličić scored eight of Tennessee’s first 10 points, putting him at the 1,000-point mark as a collegian with 15:26 left in the opening half, making him the fifth Volunteer in quadruple figures.
• Each of Gainey’s three prior six-assist outings came during his career at USC Upstate: Jan. 22, 2022, against Charleston Southern; Jan. 29, 2022, at North Carolina A&T; and Dec. 3, 2022, at Western Carolina.
• Phillips reached double digits in the scoring column for the sixth time in his career, including the second in SEC play.
• Phillips’ last double-figure point total—and his lone prior one in SEC action—came in a 10-point showing Jan. 15 against Georgia.
• Before Saturday, Phillips’ career-best scoring mark was 13 points, registered Nov. 17, 2024, against Austin Peay.
• The lone prior contest in which Phillips made six field goals was a 6-of-8 showing Dec. 3, 2024, versus Syracuse.
