Diamond DeShields has her own view of her play

Here comes Diamond DeShields and, whoosh, there she goes.

Jaime Nared watched her Tennessee women’s basketball teammate speed by Thursday night while dribbling through Florida’s full-court press.

“She was playing in attack mode the whole night,” Nared said. “I think when she’s playing in attack mode, nobody can stop her. It was fun playing with her.”

Sitting alongside Nared in the postgame interview room, DeShields listened to the admiring recap. The redshirt junior guard had a different view of her play, however. She summed up her team-high 27 points as fulfilling an expectation. The turnovers she helped create on defense weren’t recounted without also grumbling some about the turnovers she committed.

The best superlative DeShields could muster was simply “nice.”

DeShields’ personal perspective on Thursday, or any given night, is better understood by some thoughts she shared with ESPNW’s LaChina Robinson during a podcast earlier this month. DeShields referenced South Carolina forward A'ja Wilson, an All-American and the reigning SEC player of the year, and said: “I want to be for Tennessee the equivalent of A'ja Wilson. I want to be impactful for this program.”

On Saturday, UT coach Holly Warlick said the team needs DeShields to be that type of player.

“She’s carrying a lot of the load,” Warlick said. “But she has the ability to do that.”

Heading into a game against Wilson and the Gamecocks (18-1, 8-0 SEC) on Monday, DeShields is the scoring leader for Tennessee (13-7, 4-3), averaging 17.5 points per game. Her 9-for-13 shooting against Florida raised her field goal percentage to a click below 42 percent. Her career high was 42.6 percent as a freshman at North Carolina.

In SEC play, she’s averaging 20.3 points for seven games and shooting 44.1 percent from the floor. Her per-game rebounding average (6.9) is slightly higher than her overall average (6.6) as well.

Add a non-conference win over Notre Dame, and DeShields’ scoring average rises to 21.7 in the past eight games and her field goal percentage is 43.7.

Conversely, DeShields is averaging four turnovers per game and has nine more than total assists (72-61). Lady Vols assistant coach Dean Lockwood speculated that the nine turnovers DeShields committed in a loss at Auburn on Jan. 19 linger with her.

“She’s still a little gun shy about that,” he said. “Any time she does something like that, it bothers her.”

Regardless, Lockwood thinks DeShields has worked her way to a position of greater strength. The attack mode to which Nared referred is being implemented more judiciously. He used a military analogy in saying, “She knows she has so many rounds in a magazine and she’s not spraying rounds all over the place.”

“I think the timing of how she asserts herself, and this is me personally, I like it a lot more now than I did maybe five weeks ago,” Lockwood said.

Lockwood also believes DeShields’ overall effort is more “honest” and “authentic.” He was thinking primarily of her defense. He also noted, though, greater vigilance in minding her body language.

“You don’t get anywhere when you roll your eyes or sag your shoulders,” Lockwood said. “That’s negative energy. It actually drains you more than fills you up.”

As for the turnovers, the coaching staff has been encouraging the 6-foot-1 DeShields to coil her posture and thereby shorten her dribble. On Thursday, she misfired on two passes. But she also timed and delivered perfectly an entry to center Mercedes Russell for a crucial layup after Florida had rallied within eight points inside the final 2 ½ minutes.

DeShields’ personal work has taken place within the context of the team trying to grasp its identity. Warlick revisited the 3 ½ hour meeting that took place after a loss at Ole Miss on Jan. 12 and its role in the process.

“I think our team in general has struggled at times as far as identifying (players’) roles,” Warlick said. “We went back and redefined them. I think they understand our expectations for each of them.”

DeShields likely didn’t need any reminder. Her understanding, much like her view, is pretty clear.

Reynolds Update: Warlick said “by all my indications” senior point guard Jordan Reynolds is fine after suffering a left ankle injury on Thursday.

The team didn’t practice on Friday.