For sixth-ranked Tennessee, December has been a time for adjusting on the fly.
The Lady Volunteers had to play without their starting point guard during a two-game road trip to the Northeast. Now they must adjust to traveling across the country for a two-game swing on the West coast.
So far everything has worked out for Tennessee (6-2), which got victories against No. 23 DePaul and No. 11 Rutgers. After spending approximately 32 hours in Knoxville, the Lady Vols on Thursday boarded a plane bound for Los Angeles, where they will face UCLA on Saturday before traveling to No. 4 Stanford on Tuesday.
''We've got two big games ahead of us, and our last game is probably the hardest of all four games,'' associate head coach Holly Warlick said. ''We just continue to take one game at a time and to just play to our ability and play hard. Great things happen to this team when we play hard.''
Making adjustments is nothing new to Tennessee, which has been adapting to changes ever since coach Pat Summitt revealed in August she had been diagnosed with early onset dementia, Alzheimer's type.
While the 59-year-old Summitt always has received a warm welcome on road trips, the Hall of Famer was the subject of even more attention during the Lady Vols' trip to the Northeast. She received the Maggie Dixon Courage award before Tennessee's game against DePaul in New York at Madison Square Garden, and Rutgers donned ''We Back Pat'' warm-up shirts and presented Summitt with a commemorative jersey.
Warlick expects Summitt to receive similar attention Saturday at UCLA, a school the Lady Vols haven't visited since 2007.
''I think the emotion for Tennessee coming there and Pat Summitt coming to the gym, I think that's going to be a special environment,'' she said.
Warlick has made plenty of her own adjustments this year.
Though Summitt has often relied on her longtime assistants to draw up plays, Warlick and assistant coaches Mickie DeMoss and Dean Lockwood have taken on a bigger load during games. While Summitt continues to shout at players from the sideline, it's Warlick who's usually at the center of a huddle during timeouts with the clipboard.
Warlick also has been handling postgame news conferences, though Summitt speaks with reporters after the Lady Vols' practices.
Together, the coaches decided to give the Lady Vols a day off Wednesday rather than make them practice as planned. After arriving home around 1 a.m., the players slept in a bit and caught up on laundry and other chores during their brief time in Knoxville.
''I was starting to feel it in my legs. I'm happy we had the day off, but I'm just playing through it,'' forward Shekinna Stricklen said.
Stricklen, a preseason All-American, has been holding the team together this season with her consistent play. The senior has 13 steals and is averaging 16.9 points and 8.8 rebounds per game.
Her leadership on the floor has been especially important ever since freshman point guard Ariel Massengale, who started the first six games of the season, dislocated her left middle finger during practice last week. Stricklen and sophomore guard Meighan Simmons are filling in while Massengale recovers.
''We're getting it done,'' Stricklen said with a smile. ''Me and Meighan, we're getting the job done, but we know it would be better if Ariel was back. She's a true point guard and she really controls this team.''
It's not an unfamiliar job for the duo. The Lady Vols had been without a true starting point guard for three seasons, and Stricklen and Simmons shared the job last season with occasional help from guard Taber Spani and forward Alicia Manning in what the coaches called ''point guard by committee.''
Stricklen had 22 points and nine rebounds to lead the team in the 67-61 win over Rutgers, and Simmons fought her way through a shooting slump to hit clutch consecutive 3-pointers to help the Lady Vols regain control of the game after blowing a 13-point lead.
''They handled their pressure, and that's what we need,'' Warlick said. ''If we have to do it by committee, so be it, as long as we can get our offense we're OK with that.''
