INDIANAPOLIS — No. 3 Kentucky and No. 2 Tennessee will tangle for the third time this season, and the stakes are higher than ever in the first NCAA Tournament meeting between the rivals.The Southeastern Conference foes collide in the first of two Midwest Region semifinal games at Lucas Oil Stadium on Friday night. The winner sticks around to play for a ticket to the Final Four against the winner of the other semifinal between No. 1 seed Houston and No. 4 seed Purdue.”I don’t think we have to do anything different,” Wildcats guard Koby Brea said Thursday. “I think we’ve got to do the same thing against every team, consider to be ourselves. We trust each other on the court. We know what we’re capable of doing. Tennessee is obviously a really good opponent. Gotta give them respect and we’re coming into the game with the same mentality that we came into the first two.”Tennessee (29-7) reached the Sweet 16 for the third consecutive season and can make it back-to-back Elite Eight appearances for the first time in school history. Among SEC schools, only Kentucky, with nine, has more second-weekend NCAA Tournament trips than Tennessee (eight) since 2007.Kentucky (24-11) hasn’t defeated Tennessee three times in a season since 2005. Head coach Mark Pope said the Wildcats can’t count on any benefit from wins in Knoxville in January or the Feb. 11 win at Rupp Arena, when Kentucky limited Tennessee to 16.7 percent 3-point shooting (3 of 18).”I think mostly this is a free-standing game. This is a great Tennessee team,” Pope said. “It’s one of the top teams in the country. It’s the best defensive team in the country. They have one of the best offensive teams in the country.”Hired to return to the program he played for in the 1990s, Pope replaced John Calipari as head coach a year ago amid a run of postseason disappointments. He began rebuilding his roster from scratch, and the vision is coming into focus with a team that found another gear over the last month. The Wildcats shot the lights out in Milwaukee and clamped 3-point shooters for Troy and Illinois, holding them to a combined 17-of-64 (.266) from 3-point range.Tennessee had to replace All-American and SEC Player of the Year Dalton Knecht after reaching the Elite Eight in 2024. Barnes landed Chaz Lanier, a North Florida transfer who arrived in time to fuel the return trip in progress. Lanier set the school record with 120 3-pointers (and counting), was First Team All-SEC and honorable mention All-American in 2024-25. Thus far, he hasn’t blinked under the lights of the NCAA Tournament with 49 points in two games.”I really didn’t know what to expect,” Lanier said. “It was super fun. All the bright lights. … We just try to stay where our feet are planted with the mantality we’re going to go out and handle business.”