Kim Caldwell has a lot to be thankful for this week with her team ending November undefeated and the arrival of her first child inching ever closer with a due date in early January.

“A lot of blessings going around,” said Caldwell, who is in her first season as head coach of the Lady Vols basketball program. “But I’m thankful for my team. I’m thankful that I get to show up and coach them every day.”

That team is now 5-0 and averaging 98.2 points per game in a high-octane offense. The defense remains an ongoing quest to be better, but it took a step forward against Western Carolina with a 102-50 win after allowing Liberty to score 93 points.

The schedule also is about to get a lot tougher with Florida State making a trip to Knoxville for a Dec. 4 game and then a trip to New York to play Iowa on Dec. 7. That will mark the first time the Lady Vols have left home to play a game in the 2024-25 season.

“November was kind of about us, making sure that we got our flow, got our groove, because everything we do is a little bit different,” Caldwell said. “We really need to take a few more steps forward going into the tougher part of our non-conference.”

After intensive practices in the gap between the Liberty and Western Carolina games, the players got two days off this week on Wednesday and Thursday to enjoy Thanksgiving and will return to practice now. The Seminoles also like to play a high-speed offense, so the game this coming Wednesday should be entertaining for fans. The popularity of the team continues to show at the turnstiles – or perhaps scanners is the term used now – as more than 8,000 season tickets have been sold.

Ruby Whitehorn, a transfer from Clemson, will be familiar with Florida State since she played in the ACC for two  years.

“I think being locked in is very, very important and playing together,” Whitehorn said. “I feel like playing together on offense and defense is what separates us from having a good game and from having an okay game and then a great game.”

Whitehorn has been a key piece of Caldwell’s system as she can score – the 6-0 junior guard from Detroit is lethal in the paint – and also defend the length of the court. Her mother, Lisa Bryant, was in town for Tuesday’s game and stayed to make Thanksgiving dinner. She explained why in this social post attached to a post-game video of Whitehorn talking about her mother coming to games despite the distance.

Bryant also added: I agree wholeheartedly the culture is the reason we are here. It truly means the world to my kid and she has felt nothing but loved and support from the entire community. And for that I am eternally thankful to you all, thank you for loving and embracing my kid.

PAT SUMMITT

The captain of the mothership that is Lady Vols basketball has been gone more than eight years after passing away June 28, 2016, from Alzheimer’s disease.

Coach Jonathan Tsipis

Jonathan Tsipis, the head coach for Western Carolina, has a deep connection to women’s basketball after serving as a head coach at George Washington and Wisconsin and from 2003-12, being on the staff for the now-retired Muffet McGraw at Notre Dame. He also coached at various times with men’s college basketball teams.

While at Notre Dame, he was on the bench as an assistant coach multiple times when the Irish and the Lady Vols met on the court in Knoxville, South Bend and at neutral sites.

The two teams played in Knoxville on January 5, 2008, an 87-63 win for Tennessee, which was en route to its eighth national title and as it turned out, the last one for Summitt, who had to retire at the end of the 2011-12 season because of her illness.

This week was Tsipis’ first trip back to Tennessee since Summitt had passed away. When the Catamounts held shoot-around on game day this week, Tsipis chatted with former Lady Vol Tamika Catchings, who served as analyst for the matchup on the SEC Network. Catchings also is a businessowner in Indianapolis of Tea’s Me Cafe, which has expanded its products into grocery stores in the area.

“I was telling this to Tamika Catchings, in my very first year at Notre Dame, we had the opportunity to come,” Tsipis said. “There are two things that Coach Summitt – it was just always amazing to me – one, we played on a Sunday, and on Monday, Coach McGraw and Coach Summitt were on the phone trying to make their teams better, sharing information. I was like, ‘I tell you, Coach, this never happens on the men’s side after you play a game.’ ”

Pat Summitt and Mickie DeMoss. (UT Athletics)

The second memory involved recruiting when Summitt and Tsipis were recruiting the same high school player in Cleveland, Ohio, in a crowded gym. The presence of Summitt at an event always generated attention and the organizers brought two seats for Summitt and her pilot.

“She said, ‘Please bring us three seats,’ ” Tsipis said. “She made sure I had a seat because she knew I was there to watch. It’s tremendous when you see it from the outside and then you read about her. I think that legacy, I think that meant a lot.

“I talked more to Tamika about her getting her master’s at Notre Dame, her taking her business and continuing to do that more than just basketball. I know that’s what Coach Summitt is smiling down upon her, looking at that. Because ultimately, as much as we’re trying to make competitive basketball teams, hopefully my players can look back here and see the experience. They don’t have to remember the score but understanding taking a step of what they can do in the next part of their lives.

“I think that that’s one area Coach Summitt doesn’t ever get enough credit. She put women’s basketball ahead of her own program, a lot of times even at their most successful times. It’s such a special place. And I think no matter who’s coaching, this will always be Coach Summitt’s program.”

Maria M. Cornelius, a senior writer/editor at MoxCar Marketing + Communications since 2013, started her journalism career at the Knoxville News Sentinel and began writing about the Lady Vols in 1998. In 2016, she published her first book, “The Final Season: The Perseverance of Pat Summitt,” through The University of Tennessee Press.