Tennessee men's basketball coach Bruce Pearl never said it would be pretty, and Tuesday night it wasn't.

The Vols defeated preseason Sun Belt Conference favorite Louisiana-Lafayette 83-76, but not before some anxious moments.

Andre Patterson led the Vols (2-0) with 21 points, and Major Wingate overcame a foot injury suffered in a Sunday night practice to score 12 points and play 28 minutes.

But just when it appeared the Vols were rolling, leading by 21 as late as the 13:50 mark, the Ragin' Cajuns showed how they reached the NCAA tournament the past two seasons.

Louisiana-Lafayette took a 66-65 lead on Ed Turner's 3-pointer with 4:57 remaining, capping an 25-5 run and silencing the Thompson-Boling Arena crowd of 12,089.

Finally, Pearl had seen enough, and called time out to tell his team as much.

"I don't like calling timeouts in runs because of trying to wear the opponent down,'' Pearl said. "But we weren't defending them, we couldn't keep them off the backboards and we were getting out of character on offense.''

Once play resumed, C.J. Watson saw to it the Vols regained their identity, drilling a 3-pointer and drawing a foul that enabled him to finish off a rare four-point play and give UT a 69-66 lead with 4:42 left.

"I knew I was going to shoot coming out of the huddle,'' said Watson, who finished with 17 points and scored the 1,000th point of his career on the play. "I'll be a lot more assertive and aggressive in those situations.''

The Ragin' Cajuns (0-2) tied it back up at 69-69 with a trey, but on Louisiana-Lafayette's next trip down the court, Chris Lofton grabbed one of his team-high seven rebounds and fired an outlet pass to Stanley Asumnu who dunked.

The Ragin' Cajuns misfired again, and Dane Bradshaw made them pay at the other end, bouncing a pass to Watson who hit a 3-pointer at the top of the key, giving the Vols a 74-69 lead.

Louisiana-Lafayette didn't draw closer than three points from there.

Pearl conceded the Vols won in an unorthodox manner, but the Ragin' Cajuns played left-handed as well.

Michael Southall, Louisiana-Lafayette's much-ballyhooed 6-foot-10 post player, ran into foul trouble and played just 16 minutes, scoring four points and gathering five rebounds.

Dwayne Mitchell, a 6-5 transfer from Auburn, picked up the slack. Mitchell scored 19 points and pulled down 20 rebounds as the Ragin' Cajuns held a 50-32 advantage on the boards.

The athletic Mitchell was also largely responsible for shutting down Lofton, who was held without a basket the first 13 minutes and finished with 12 points.

Much to Pearl's chagrin, the Vols' defense was unable to force the tempo despite forcing 20 turnovers.

Tennessee also showed it has much work to be done in its half-court offense.

Louisiana-Lafayette's 25-5 run came with the Vols struggling in their sets. UT didn't hit a field goal for more than seven minutes and sank just 5-of-11 free throws.

It led Pearl to tell his team just how bad they were playing during the timeout preceding Watson's pivotal four-point play.

"I told them (during the timeout), 'Would you like to be down 10? Isn't it great we're only down one?' '' Pearl said. "I said, 'It's a one-point game, let's do the things we've got to do to win.'

"This team has to learn how to win, and tonight was a nice step in that direction.''

The Vols appeared to be taking a giant step through the first 20 minutes, staking out a 43-25 halftime lead when Lofton hit an off-balance, one-handed 3-pointer at the buzzer.

UT used a pair of 7-0 runs to pull away in the first half, connecting on 51.5-percent (17-of-33) of its shots.

Wingate, on crutches earlier in the day after spending the last two nights in the training room,, helped set the early tempo by blocking a Southall shot in front of the rim.

"We all fed off that,'' Watson said. "This just shows how much we've improved as a team to lose a lead, fight back, and still be able to win the game in the last three or four minutes.''