Ready or not, here comes the SEC basketball season.

Tennessee looked plenty ready Wednesday night, easily dispatching South Alabama, 87-69, at Thompson-Boling Arena to improve to 9-1.

Beginning Sunday at South Carolina, the Vols step up to a steady diet of SEC opponents. The only exception, No. 4 Memphis on Jan. 18, won't be a port in the storm.

"It's a new season,'' said coach Bruce Pearl.

The Vols finished up the old one on a roll. Pearl had sold South Alabama (9-3) to his team as a game that could prove pivotal in March.

"I told the guys this was an important game as far as postseason if we can get ourselves into position to be somewhere near that (NCAA tournament) bubble,'' Pearl said.

"Because this was one that could help us or it could hurt us. South Alabama is a good team and I thought we played well to take them out of range of being able to win the game.''

A season-low crowd of 11,248 witnessed the Vols lead by as many as 27 points and shoot a season-best 56.5 percent (35-of-62) from the field.

And that was after cooling off.

When Jordan Howell's 3-pointer gave UT its biggest lead of the game, 69-42, the Vols were clipping along at 62.8 percent.

From that point, Tennessee seemed to ease off the gas pedal. A wave of basket-swapping ensued, with South Alabama getting the better of it to whittle the margin to 79-65 before JaJuan Smith and Dane Bradshaw hit 3-pointers.

Major Wingate led a balanced UT attack with 17 points on 8-of-11 shooting. Seven of his points came in a 9-0 burst to open the second half and expand a 15-point lead to 57-33.

"If South Alabama had a weakness,'' said Pearl, "they weren't very big inside and we went there.''

C.J. Watson contributed 16 points, five assists (and zero turnovers).

Chris Lofton scored all 14 of his points in the first half, nine of them during a 15-2 run that blew open a 14-12 game.

JaJuan Smith contributed 10 points and Andre Patterson just missed being the fifth Vol in double figures, scoring nine.

"They are outstanding,'' said South Alabama coach John Pelphrey, "the best we have played so far in terms of those guards and their shooters.''

Bradshaw scored only six points but dished out a career-high eight assists.

One of them was a steal and behind-the-back flick to Watson for a break-away layup. That was one of eight first-half steals by UT.

"We were really able to feed off our defense,'' said Bradshaw.

"After the Oklahoma State game (UT's only loss on Dec. 22), everybody was wondering how we'd bounce back. We've really played a lot better on the defensive end.''

South Alabama got 17 points from guard Mario Jointer and 16 — all in the second half — from Michael Phillips.

The Jaguars led once, 7-6, after which Wingate's 18-footer put UT back in front to stay.

"This is a good way to go into the SEC,'' said Wingate. "This win will serve us well.''

The collective nine wins is a huge improvement over the 7-5 record UT took into conference play last season.

"In the past,'' said Bradshaw, "we've always come down later in the season to where our last chance (for an NCAA bid) is winning the SEC tournament.

"Now we've put ourselves into position where if we can just perform well in the SEC, even 9-7 would give us a good chance. That's 18 wins.''

500 Club: Watson became the fourth UT player with 500 career assists. He trails Johnny Darden (715), Rodney Woods (525) and Tony Harris (509). Watson became just the ninth player in SEC history with 1,000 points and 500 assists.

Notebook: UT's previous best shooting night was Dec. 27 against Alabama A&M (55.4 percent). ... Senior walk-on Eddie DeBro gave the Vols nine good minutes, eight in the first half when Stanley Asumnu got in foul trouble. DeBro had three rebounds, two points, two assists and a steal. ... UT's 29 assists were a season-high and eight turnovers a season-low.