Jason Edwards scored 18 points and Jaylen Carey had a double-double as Vanderbilt held on to upset sixth-ranked Tennessee 76-75 on Saturday in Nashville, Tenn.
Carey paired 14 points with 10 rebounds off the bench for the Commodores (15-3, 3-2 Southeastern Conference), who also got 13 points from Tyler Nickel. A.J. Hoggard added 11 points and six assists to help Vanderbilt win its second straight game.
Chaz Lanier finished with 17 points and Zakai Zeigler bundled 16 points with 10 assists to lead the Volunteers (16-2, 3-2). Felix Okpara and Igor Milicic also had 16 points for Tennessee, which had a two-game win streak snapped.
The Volunteers trailed by 10 with 3:48 to go before scoring eight straight to close within 76-74 with 45 seconds left.
After missing the front end of a one-and-one, Vanderbilt’s Tyler Tanner fouled Lanier about 60 feet from the basket with two seconds left to put him at the line with a chance to tie the game.
Lanier hit the first shot but missed the second, and the rebound ricocheted off to the left as the clock expired and the home crowd rushed the court.
Tennessee finished 17-of-21 at the line, while the Commodores went 16-of-19.
Vanderbilt led by six at halftime and took the first double-digit lead for either team early in the second half.
Edwards beat the shot clock with a 30-foot 3-pointer and drilled a transition trey 26 seconds later to make it 50-40 with 17:20 left. After a Zeigler turnover, Nickel buried a 3 from the left side to cap a 12-0 run.
The Commodores led by as many as 16 in the second half until the Volunteers rallied.
Tennessee shot 7-of-14 from 3-point range in the first half, but Vanderbilt led 41-35 thanks to an 18-8 edge on points in the paint, a plus-5 margin in rebounding and a plus-2 in turnovers.
An 11-1 run capped by Zeigler’s wide-open 3, on the heels of his spectacular assist to Okpara for an alley-oop dunk, gave the Volunteers a 19-11 lead and forced a Commodores time out with 12:17 remaining in the first half.
Vanderbilt, though, punched back, playing an aggressive, man-to-man defense and re-took the lead at 30-28 when Carey backed his man down in the lane and hit a layup.
That was part of an 11-0 run that gave the Commodores a 35-28 advantage.
–Field Level Media
