Tennessee guard J.P. Prince had a great Christmas break - and so did his bum ankle.

Prince, who suffered a badly sprained left ankle during a walk-through before the Dec. 13 game at Temple, missed that game and the next two, including Saturday's 79-77 win over Belmont.

UT coach Bruce Pearl gave the Vols a five-day break after the Belmont game. They returned to practice Friday night at UT's Pratt Pavilion.

Prince, a 6-foot-7 junior from Memphis, looked unhampered by his ankle.

"I felt a lot better than I've been feeling," he said. "It felt good. Coach gave me time off, which I think really helped because I think if I played against Belmont I wouldn't have been back full strength and I could have struggled with this all year. So this is about as good as it's going to get, and hopefully it will be better off."

Pearl said the next couple of days should determine if Prince plays in Monday's game against Louisiana-Lafayette at Thompson-Boling Arena.

"He ran around fine (Friday night)," Pearl said, "but the key is when you've got a bad ankle sprain like that, what's going to happen when the tape comes off, and we had no contact (Friday night)."

Prince is averaging 11.3 points (second on the team), 3.4 rebounds, and 23 minutes in eight games this season - despite coming off offseason arthroscopic surgery on his left shoulder and a minor ankle injury early in the season.

The freak injury at Temple - he slipped on the side of the court - was the latest of his mishaps.

"I can tell you that we need (Prince) back," Pearl said. "I can tell you how important it is to have him back. I can tell you how pleased I am to have won two of our last three games without him, because prior to the Temple game he was really, really coming on in practice and starting to really play well."

The Vols, with the program's longest home winning streak (36 games), face a tough three-game stretch before starting their SEC schedule Jan. 10 at Georgia.

After Monday's game, the Vols play at Kansas on Jan. 3 and play host to Gonzaga Jan. 7.

"We've got three days to get ready for Louisiana-Lafayette," Pearl said. "(Friday) is about conditioning. (Today) we'll put the scout in and we'll play against Louisiana-Lafayette and the scout team. We'll back it off a little bit on Sunday, play Monday, Tuesday we'll probably take off or be very, very light and then we've got three or four days to get ready for Kansas."

Childress Update: Senior forward Ryan Childress continued to practice Friday after being limited in practice before the Belmont game. Childress is coming off a knee injury sustained in the offseason.

Call Me UL: Louisiana-Lafayette is asking media to refer to the school as simply Louisiana and not Louisiana-Lafayette on first reference and UL as an abbreviation, not ULL.

© 2008, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.