BIRMINGHAM, Ala. ‐- In a continuing effort to recognize the accomplishments of student‐athletes beyond the field of competition, the SEC once again has highlighted a Community Service Team for women’s basketball for the 2022‐23 season. Tennessee junior Tess Darby has been named as a member of that squad.
This marks the 25th year for the SEC Community Service Team for women’s basketball as well as for men’s basketball. All league‐sponsored sports have had a Community Service Team since 2004, with at‐large teams for men’s and women’s sports being chosen from 1999‐2003. The SEC began the concept with a football Community Service Team in 1994.
Darby, a native of Greenfield, Tenn., is a graduate of Tennessee Athletics’ VOLeaders Academy. She embarked on a leadership and service trip to Rwanda in the summer of 2022. While there, she participated in “Together in Sport,” helping promote healthy habits and sport to local children as well as helping run a women’s empowerment program teaching teenage girls how to sew as a means for steady employment.
She also was involved with “Shooting Touch,” an organization using basketball to provide health and wellness services to young children and women; “Musanze Tennis Club,” where she helped facilitate games and drills with the kids in this program, many of whom never played tennis or had access to the sport; and “Sunzu Village Sport Festival,” featuring a day of play with children in the village, where a brand-new playground was unveiled and she helped teach the children how to use it.
Darby participated in several other outreach opportunities. She was involved with Hoops for Hope, a fun day of basketball with the Tennessee women’s and men’s teams for individuals with Down Syndrome; Reach for the Summitt 5K, serving as a cheerleader for participants in the Pat Summitt Foundation fundraising event; Voloween, a Tennessee Athletics Halloween event for campus staff families; Young Williams Animal Shelter, volunteering to feed animals, clean cages and give walks; and Adopt a Family, a Christmas event partnering Tennessee Women’s Basketball and East Tennessee Children’s Hospital.
A 6-foot-1 guard/forward, Darby is averaging 7.8 points and 3.1 rebounds this season, leading the team with 58 three-pointers made while shooting 41.7 percent from beyond the arc, 43 percent overall from the field and 83.3 percent on free throws. One of three Lady Vols to appear in every game this season with a team-high 27 starts, she has scored in double figures nine times, including each of the past four games.
In SEC action, the finance major is putting up 9.9 ppg. and 3.7 rpg. and ranks No. 2 among league players in three-point field goal percentage (40.5) and No. 3 in three-point field goals made per contest (2.43). Over the last four contests, she has elevated her production to 13.0 ppg. and 4.5 rpg., shooting 48.5 percent overall, 50 percent on threes and 100 percent on free throws.
-UT Athletics
