Tennessee’s coaching staff all wore We Back Pat shirts on the sideline. Every player jersey had the name of Summitt on the back. The namesake of the night would be happy with the 86-73 win on Thursday night.

Every year beginning with the 2011-12 season, the SEC has held a “We Back Pat” week for all of the league’s teams. It was appropriate that the Lady Vols got it started in 2025.

The games are used to raise awareness of the Pat Summitt Foundation, which the legendary Pat Summitt founded in 2011 after being diagnosed with early onset dementia. Summitt coached her last season at Tennessee in 2011-12 and passed away from the brutal disease in 2016.

“Humbling” was the word Kim Caldwell used when asked about being the head coach at Tennessee for the “We Back Pat” game. Caldwell, of course, knew who Summitt was and has read all of her books. She grew up in West Virginia and watched the Lady Vols.

Tennessee is 15-2 overall and 3-2 in the SEC. Ruby Whitehorn led the Lady Vols with 20 points, while Samara Spencer notched 18 points, Talaysia Cooper tallied 16 points, and Jewel Spear added 13 points.

The current Lady Vols players were in elementary school when Summitt was last on the sidelines. But Spear and Whitehorn both said it was special to play at Tennessee for this game with Summitt on their jerseys.

A scoreboard video during a timeout showed the famous clip of Summitt in a cheerleader’s outfit singing “Rocky Top” at halftime of a Vols game. The crowd of 9,018 erupted, and both Spear and Whitehorn said they heard it and tried to sneak a peek while huddling around their head coach.

After the game, Caldwell, Whitehorn and Spear met with the media in what became a laughter-filled session. Caldwell has her players believing in themselves and has established a balance of tough coach on the court and warm and engaging person off of it.

The press conference is worth a watch and can be seen HERE.

The program is officially on baby watch now as Caldwell said in her media session earlier in the week that her first child could arrive very soon. The next two games for the Lady Vols are on the road in nearby Nashville on Sunday and then a trip to Austin, Texas, next week. The availability of Caldwell will depend on when her son arrives in the world.

Her team took care of business in Knoxville with the win and forced the Bulldogs into 20 turnovers that the Lady Vols converted into 30 points. The Lady Vols won the board battle, 40-33, and Summitt would have especially approved of that.

“I think it was special just knowing who Pat Summitt was as a coach here at Tennessee, and the legacy that she left for not only women’s basketball, but women’s sports in general,” Spear said. “Being able to play here at Tennessee, having a lot of greats before us and being able to put this jersey on and play with pride, I think it was very special.”

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.