No. 18 Tennessee loses primetime exhibition game to No. 6 Duke, 83-76

The closest bracket is more than four months away. The biggest non-conference test is still four weeks away. But Tennessee Basketball had a capacity crowd for an exhibition game against Duke that felt like anything but a preseason game Sunday night at Food City Center.

The 18th-ranked Vols controlled the first half, but No. 6 Duke’s star power was too much after halftime, with the Blue Devils taking over and staying in control in an 83-76 win.

Five-star freshmen Nate Ament and Cameron Boozer — Boozer was the No. 3 overall player in the 2025 Rivals recruiting rankings, one spot ahead of Ament at No. 4 — drew a combined 39 scouts, general managers and presidents of basketball operations from 22 different NBA teams. 

And it was Boozer, the 6-foot-9, 250-pound freshman and son of former Duke and NBA star forward Carlos Boozer, who starred on the big stage. He scored 24 points, had 23 rebounds and six assists in 39 dominant minutes to lead Duke.

Isaiah Evans added 20 points on 4-for-9 shooting from the 3-point line for the Blue Devils and Patrick Ngongba had 15 points, nine rebounds and three assists.

Tennessee got 19 points and eight assists from transfer point guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie, but he was just 5-for-21 from the field, including 3-for-13 from the 3-point line. Ament struggled with his shot, too, scoring 14 points on 5-for-19 shooting from the field, going 0-for-5 from three. He had 10 rebounds for a double-double in his unofficial debut.

Freshman forward DeWayne Brown had 10 points and five rebounds off the bench and starting center Felix Okpara had 11 points and eight rebounds.

Duke took over with a 23-9 run to start the second half, going from never leading in the first half to never losing its grip on the game after halftime. The biggest lead was nine midway through the second half.

When Tennessee cut the deficit down to two, at 62-60 after a Gillespie pull-up three in transition, Duke scored nine of the next 11 to get the lead back to 71-62 with 7:44 left. 

Vols led by as many as nine in the first half

Tennessee never trailed in the first half and led 43-37 at halftime after getting 10 points from Brown on 5-for-5 shooting from the floor, to go with four rebounds. 

Okpara had seven points and seven rebounds before the break and Ament had six points and five boards while going 3-for-10 from the field. Gillespie had five points and five assists on 2-for-9 shooting as Tennessee’s two preseason stars struggled to hit shots. 

Duke got 13 points, 15 rebounds and four assists from Boozer in 18 minutes in the first half.

Tennessee’s biggest lead was nine, at 43-34, with 50 seconds left in the first half. After cutting the deficit to six at halftime, Duke started the second half with the 23-9 run over the first six minutes of the second half.

What’s next for Tennessee Basketball

Tennessee opens the regular-season schedule against Mercer on November 3, a 7 p.m. Eastern Time start on SEC Network+ at Food City Center, 

Other non-conference home games over the next month are against Northern Kentucky (November 8), North Florida (November 12), Rice (November 17) and Tennessee State (November 20) before going on the road for the Players Era Men’s Championship in Las Vegas. 

The Vols will play Rutgers at the MGM Garden Arena to open the tournament on November 24 and will play Houston on November 25, before playing a third to-be-determined opponent on either November 26 or November 27.