After Samara Spencer set a new Lady Vols record for made three-pointers in a game with nine, Zee Spearman and Ruby Whitehorn were determined to celebrate their teammate after the win over North Carolina Central on Saturday.

The following was the post-game exchange among the trio with a video clip also included.

Whitehorn: “She saw me looking at her, and she started running.”

Spearman: “I had to catch her.”

Whitehorn: “We had to. We were trying to put her on our shoulders, but she was fighting us so much so we couldn’t do it. But we had to lift her up because she had a great game.”

Spearman: “She knew it was coming. She tried to hide.”

Spencer: “It was fun. But I’m not really a touchy person, and they know that, which is why they did that. I mean it was fun, but never again. Please don’t.”

Ruby: “It will happen again.”

It’s a loose team that works hard and has fun.

“We’re comfortable around each other,” coach Kim Caldwell said. “We love each other. It’s definitely a family atmosphere, and they know it’s a safe space. We were watching the clip yesterday after practice and laughing about it.”

The clip Caldwell was referring to was Spearman using the word chipmunk to describe her head coach during an interview on the Lady Vol Boost Her Club‘s YouTube channel. That also led to a funny exchange at the post-game presser that is clipped below. The YouTube interview can be watched HERE.

The Lady Vols won the game, 139-59, and rewrote Tennessee, SEC, NCAA Division I and NBA record books for most made threes in a single game with 30. Records also were set for most points scored by an SEC team. A full account of the records and game can be read HERE.

Spencer’s nine makes from the arc passed a pair of eights by former Lady Vol players Meighan Simmons in 2010 and 2013 and eight by Ariel Massengale in 2015. The encouragement to shoot comes from Caldwell even when Spencer feels like she’s struggling a bit to connect.

“Keep shooting,” Spencer said. “Honestly, that’s all it is. She tells me to keep shooting. And sometimes, me and Coach Kim joke a lot, I go to her, and I’ll be like, ‘I’m not going to shoot the ball anymore.’ And she’s like, ‘Yes, you are. Keep shooting.’ It’s good to have a coach who encourages you to shoot the ball even when you aren’t making them.”

Spencer’s 33 points was a career high – besting the 32 points she scored for Arkansas against Oral Roberts in 2022 – and she completed the double-double with 10 assists.

“I’m always a willing passer, and everybody knows that sometimes I look for other people more than I look for myself,” Spencer said. “It showed that I could look for myself but also look for other people.”

Lazaria “Zee” Spearman looks for an opening. (Kate Luffman/ Tennessee Athletics)

Caldwell has now started a Lady Vol-best 8-0 in her debut season as the head coach at Tennessee.

“I’m extremely happy for Coach Kim, it’s her first year, just breaking records so early in the season,” Whitehorn said.

Spencer transferred to Tennessee for opportunities like what happened Saturday.

“I mean, Mr. Danny brought Coach Kim here to break records, and so I feel like it’s kind of inevitable for us to be breaking records,” Spencer said in reference to Athletics Director Danny White. “I didn’t think it would happen so soon for us to make as many three pointers as we did, but I knew it was going to come.”

Tennessee will travel to the other side of the state for a Wednesday night matchup with Memphis. That will be followed by a trip to Florida for two games Dec. 20-21 against Richmond and Tulsa at the West Palm Beach Classic.

With the outcome never in doubt, every available played logged minutes, including walk-on Edie Darby who made her season debut after dealing with a foot issue. Destinee Wells, who is coming back from ACL surgery, connected on the both the record-tying and record breaking three pointers to notch the 30 team makes. Baskets by Darby and Wells set off raucous celebrations on the bench.

“They had a really good time,” Caldwell said. “I think it was huge that they were so excited for everyone else. And it could have been a game where everyone tried to get theirs, and it was a really good team win.

“I think that was huge, and there was not a whole lot of selfishness in a game where we could have been selfish. That says a lot about them.”

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.