Holly Warlick celebrates an SEC Championship!
Photo by Reed Carringer

The Lady Vols fell to Louisville last night 86-78 and with the loss a trying, but triumphant, 2012-13 season came to a close. While a trip to the Final Four is a consistent benchmark for this program, and this team fell one game short of that goal, to call the season anything other than an enormous success would be, at best, short-sighted. Tennessee opened the year with numerous question marks associated with the program. How would Holly Warlick fare in her first season replacing the winningest coach in NCAA history? How would the team make up for the loss of five starters from the previous season’s Elite Eight squad? Would the program be able to compete in a deep and talented SEC? How would two new assistants fare? In a near miraculous fashion the Lady Vols were able to answer all those questions and answer them well.

Last fall, the media and coaches picked Tennessee to finish 4th/5th in the SEC. Kentucky won the league the year prior and returned all their key pieces while both Georgia and Vanderbilt were also viewed as legitimate contenders to take home the regular season crown. The season got off to a rocky start (even in light of those diminished expectations) when the Lady Vols suffered a shocking 80-71 defeat at UTC…but the wheels weren’t about the fall off the program.

Less than two weeks after the loss at Chattanooga, Tennessee traveled to No. 23 Miami and ended the Hurricanes’ 41-game home winning streak. Then, No. 22 North Carolina came to Thompson-Boling Arena and got routed,102-57. Though Injuries began to pile up as the season progressed (six players battled significant injuries which caused them to miss time), they persevered. The Lady Vols went on to knock off numerous ranked opponents and finished the season as the SEC regular season champs with a 23-6 (14-2) record.

Though Tennessee came up a game short of the Final Four, the Lady Vols exceeded every expectation and proved they will remain a national power for the foreseeable future. Holly Warlick also demonstrated she is one of the best coaches in the nation, and just the right person to guide this program in its search for another championship. After the Lady Vols wrapped the SEC championship against Texas A&M she said something which caught my ear, “Your losses aren’t always bad if you learn from them,” she stated in reference to a loss at Missouri which motivated the team the rest of the season. Count on the Lady Vols learning from an Elite Eight loss this year and using it as a springboard to the Final Four. As Texas A&M coach Gary Blair said after the same game,  “Folks, the reign isn’t over at Tennessee.”