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BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – After putting up 20 points, 12 rebounds and five blocks in #8/11 Tennessee’s 74-63 win over #10/12 Oregon State on Sunday, Isabelle Harrison earned her first-ever Southeastern Conference Player of the Week honor.
The senior from Nashville’s Hillsboro High School also was named College Sports Madness’ SEC Player of the Week.
The 6-foot-3 Lady Vol center’s heroics in a career-high-tying 35 minutes of duty, enabled the Lady Vols to improve to 10-2 with their sixth-straight victory and run their home unbeaten streak to 12. The loss for OSU, meanwhile, dropped the Beavers to 10-1 and came after the Pac-12 team had beaten #9/8 North Carolina by 15 in Chapel Hill on Dec. 16.
Not only did Harrison set the tone offensively, she helped limit OSU’s 6-foot-6 Ruth Hamblin to 4 of 11 shooting on the day and only eight points. The junior had entered the contest shooting 69% from the field and averaging 14.0 per contest.
Harrison helped the Lady Vols erase a five-point first-half deficit and stave off repeated OSU challenges in the second half, providing some nifty moves and shots for buckets on offense and adding a pair of monster blocked shots on defense that brought the crowd of 11,123 to its feet.
The double-double was Harrison’s third of the season and 27th of her career, with the latter number ranking No. 2 among active SEC players and eighth all-time at Tennessee. Her five swats moved her past Chamique Holdsclaw into ninth on UT’s career blocks list with 115.
Scoring in double figures five times and with double-doubles twice during that span since coming back from a first-game knee injury, Harrison has enabled the Lady Vols to win back-to-back games over top-10 opponents for the first time since the 2008 NCAA Final Four.
The Lady Vols open SEC play on Friday at 9 p.m., as Missouri (10-2) comes to Thompson-Boling Arena for a game televised on the SEC Network.
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