Rick Barnes previews Tennessee-Colorado

Tennessee plays Colorado Tuesday.

On his experience with having Covid:
“Well, the toughest part was just missing all of you guys. I just wanted to hug all you guys and tell you how much I love you. That was the hardest part about isolation. There wasn’t a day that I had it that I didn’t feel like I could go to work. I could’ve gone to work. I thought it progressively got worse for me around the sixth and seventh days. I’m really thankful for Tom Izzo. Tom reached out to me early. When I get sick, I expect to start getting better each day, and I was cruising along there pretty good. It probably took me twelve days before I felt really good, and I don’t think at any point in time I lost my sense of smell or taste, but I did lose my appetite.”

On how the decision was made to make a three-game series between UT and Colorado:
“We were in the same situation with Notre Dame. We were going to play Gonzaga then drive over and play Notre Dame. We were going to play Notre Dame in a year where they would probably have 2,000 fans in the stands, and then a year later, we’re going to have 21,000 people in the stands. So, we’re going to work out some kind of compensation, because it wouldn’t be fair. So, with Colorado, we started talking. One, I think anytime you’ve got a chance to play a quality program with a coach that’s as upstanding and runs a clean and as good of a program as there is in the country, you want to be involved with them. I’ve got great respect for him [Tad Boyle]. They’re going to come in here tomorrow, and we’ve got about 3,500 people in the stands. I know when we go out there next year it will be sold out. So instead of exchanging money, we decided we would make a neutral game out of it and go to Nashville. We do want to have a presence in Nashville, and I think Nashville will receive it.”