The Lady Vols have won two SEC games in a row and with just four left in the regular season, each matchup matters because of postseason seeding.

Before Sunday’s game tipped off against Ole Miss, the NCAA Women’s Division I Basketball Committee released its first reveal of the top 16 teams, as of now, in position to host the early rounds of the NCAA tourney. Tennessee checked in at No. 16, meaning it’s the fourth No. 4 seed and could start play in Knoxville.

A second reveal with be held Feb. 27. Selection Sunday on March 16 will be the official unveiling of the brackets. The Lady Vols want to be among the first 16 in both of those, especially the last one that counts.

Tennessee took care of its immediate business with the 80-71 win over Ole Miss. As coach Kim Caldwell noted after the game, the Lady Vols would have had that No. 16 on paper for a few hours during the game, but a loss would have evaporated it.

“It’s good that we can breathe another day,” Caldwell said.

To keep it, Tennessee faces another must-win game this Thursday, Feb. 20, against Alabama at 6:30 p.m. in the penultimate home game of the regular season at Thompson-Boling Arena at Food City Center. If you’ve been thinking about getting to arena this regular season, the last two dates are Feb. 20 and March 2. In between, the Lady Vols travel to Florida and Kentucky.

Caldwell has mentioned that the earlier close losses in SEC play against top teams still haunt her. She knows the stakes in postseason, and every win before that puts a team in a better seeding position.

Jewel Spear also understands, and the fifth-year senior is playing like it. She poured in 28 points against Ole Miss on 9-11 shooting. She has connected on five three-pointers in back-to-back games and has moved into eighth place on the Lady Vols’ all-time scoring list, including transfers, with 2,123 points during her collegiate career, including three seasons at Wake Forest.

Spear has emerged even more as a team leader and keeps her cool when things get dicey on the court. The SEC is a physical league and it was on display in the Tennessee-Ole Miss game with words exchanged and some pushing. Spear is the one who stays calm.

“I will always love and appreciate a player that can be level-headed and steady,” Caldwell said. “It helps calm everyone around them. When you’re a leader on the floor and you can just talk to people calmly no matter what, whether you’re up 10, down 10, that’s a breath of fresh air for a coach.”

Spear also has become a clutch player with a knack for hitting threes – such as she did late against UConn – when Tennessee has to have a bucket.

“I love it,” said senior guard Samara Spencer, who transferred from Arkansas. “I’m glad to be able to play with somebody who we can go to in times where – because we had a lot of stretches where we could not score the ball – and just being able for Jewel to come out here and be the hot hand for us to go to her when we need a bucket.”

Spear also has taken care of the ball in SEC play and is one of four Tennessee guards – the others are Spencer, Kaniya Boyd and Tess Darby – to have more assists than turnovers in conference play.

Tennessee plays fast and that can cause more turnovers – additional ball-handling skill work in the offseason still will be a must – but the Lady Vols have adjusted better when it happens.

“It’s something we talked about,” Caldwell said. “You can turn the ball over 200 times, just don’t get scored on. And we talked about what our effort was going to be like after a mistake.”

Samara Spencer looks for an opening against Ole Miss. (Kate Luffman/Tennessee Athletics)

Tennessee had 20 turnovers against Ole Miss. The Rebels got just four points off of them. Ole Miss had 19 turnovers. Tennessee turned that into 24 points.

Spear knows what’s in front of her team. She also knows the focus has to be on the next game, next play, next possession.

“I think we’re pretty locked in, honestly,” Spear said. “We still have room to grow, but the sense of urgency is there, especially with a lot of seniors on our team. We know we have to win every game.

“We can’t let games slip by. This is our last year, so I think everybody’s buying into that, and it’s helping the urgency and the competitiveness and practices.”

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.