Tennessee cracks the top 5 ahead of matchup with Syracuse

The Tennessee basketball Volunteers came in at #3 in the latest AP Poll and will have another chance to make a statement on Tuesday night when they host Syracuse for the SEC/ACC Challenge. Tennessee is coming off a Thanksgiving Eve demolition of UT Martin while Syracuse is coming off a 10-point win over Cornell. Tennessee is expected to win big as they currently come in at -19.5-point favorites.

The Vols are ranked #2 in the KenPom rankings and with the way they’ve dominated their opponents so far it comes as no surprise. The Vol’s lowest margin of victory has been 15 against Baylor in the Bahamas, and Baylor is a perennial tournament team. With the way the Vols have performed early in the season it is very likely that they will be undefeated heading into conference play. After Syracuse the Vols host Miami and then will play Illinois on the road before finishing the non-conference slate with 3 lower-level opponents. Clearly the biggest hurdle before conference play is Illinois on the road but these Vols will certainly be up to the challenge.

The Vols will have to take care of the Syracuse Orange first though and they will be doing so in the brand-new basketball version of the dark mode jerseys.