Mike Wilson | Knoxville

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ATHENS, Ga. — Saturday night started off well enough for Grant Williams.

The Vols standout took a quick post entry from Jordan Bone, turned and tossed in a short left-handed hook to give Tennessee an early 2-0 lead against Georgia. But that was it for Williams, who didn’t score from the floor in the next 59:33 of Tennessee’s 73-62 loss at Georgia.

Mike Wilson/News Sentinel

The sophomore forward missed his next seven field-goal attempts, leaving the question of whether a nagging back issue is affecting his play.

“There’s nothing wrong with him,” Vols coach Rick Barnes said. “Other than it’s that time of year and we’re going to see if he’s the player he wants to be. This is the time of the year that key guys step up and they play. There’s nothing wrong. …

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“He has to stop talking is what he has to do. He has to produce. He has to quit talking about it and do it.”

Williams finished with a season-worst five points on 1-of-8 shooting, grabbing only four rebounds, committing a pair of turnovers and fouling out late against Georgia.

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Tennessee Vols defend against South Carolina Gamecocks

Altogether, it was a disastrous night for Tennessee’s best player, who rarely has such outings. He has scored fewer than 10 points only four times in 26 games, three of which have come in the past 11.

“I’m going to push Grant because Grant hasn’t been himself for the last few weeks,” junior forward Admiral Schofield said. “We need him to be him, and he hasn’t been there.”

Williams’ play has fluctuated lately. He paced the Vols against South Carolina on Tuesday, scoring a team-high 22 and making the game-clinching hoop. He hit only one field goal in UT’s win at Kentucky on Feb. 6 and grabbed three rebounds.

The 6-foot-7 forward had four rebounds against Georgia, which bothered Barnes along with a lack of defensive execution.

“If Grant Williams would get back to wanting to rebound the ball, it would help him more than anything he could do,” Barnes said. “If he would just do that and play defense within our scheme, he would be fine."

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Williams hasn’t grabbed more than six rebounds in the past six games, averaging 4.3 in that span. But scoring hadn’t really been an issue for the Charlotte native, who averaged 16.2 points per game entering Saturday since his last single-digit scoring game at Iowa State on Jan. 27.

UT went to Williams often early against Georgia, including his game-opening post-up. He took four shots in the next seven Tennessee possessions, missing a long hook shot, a reverse layup, a mini-hook and a face-up jumper.

But it wasn’t the misses that bothered Barnes; it was that Williams didn’t fight for space in the post and make assertive moves.

“I don’t think he made but maybe one move or maybe two where he really made a hard move to the basket,” Barnes said. “He just turned and tried to shoot over top of people as opposed to fighting for space. …

“He’s perfectly content catching the ball two feet outside the lane and thinking he’s going to take his time and do this and do that. He hasn’t adjusted. That’s something we keep talking to him about.”

Tennessee asks a lot from Williams, who still is averaging a team-high 15.7 points along with 5.9 rebounds. The offense runs through the post, with Williams often having to make quick decisions facing a double team. He’s called upon to rebound consistently on both ends, usually against taller opponents.

And he’s working to do it all while fighting through a lingering back and hip injury that came to light against LSU on Jan. 31.

“We can’t put things on Grant all the time,” junior center Kyle Alexander said. “We ask him and Admiral and, sometimes, Jordan Bowden to do a lot. He has performed in a lot of games, but we can’t put it always on Grant’s shoulders. In situations like this, I don’t know. I think shots weren’t falling, so that kind of affected him maybe. It’s never just his fault.”

The challenge with Williams is he’s entirely capable of doing exactly what the Vols ask. Barnes said Williams getting back to playing steadily like Tennessee’s star is a matter of looking at himself and asking, “What do I do here?”

Schofield said the only thing holding Williams back from doing it is himself.