The Tennessee-Virginia women's basketball marquee won't be lacking name value.

Cavaliers junior guard Monica Wright is a Wooden Award candidate, a Wade Watch list member and made the All-Atlantic Coast Conference preseason team.

Tennessee freshman guard Shekinna Stricklen was a second-team All-SEC preseason honoree.

Still, the missing names also matter for a tipoff at 7 tonight at Thompson-Boling Arena (TV: SportSouth), particularly since it's early and the game will impact the national rankings.

No. 15 Virginia (1-0) will play without junior point guard Paulisha Kellum, who's out for the season with a torn anterior cruciate knee ligament. Senior forward Lyndra Littles will miss fall-semester games for academic reasons.

"It is what it is,'' Cavaliers coach Debbie Ryan said. "I think we're a little behind where we'd like to be."

Tennessee, meanwhile, didn't look like the nation's seventh-ranked team Saturday until its rookies exhaled at halftime of a 68-39 season-opening victory over San Francisco. Three returning players - center Kelley Cain, guard Angie Bjorklund and forward Vicki Baugh - all sat out the game with various ailments and at least two of them will be spectators tonight.

"They're a work in progress, just like we are,'' Ryan said.

Cain (concussion) might return tonight. The 6-foot-6 redshirt freshman did some shooting and non-contact work Sunday. Jenny Moshak, the Lady Vols associate athletic director for sports medicine, said Cain would participate in today's shooting practice and then be examined by Dr. Rebecca Morgan, the team physician.

Bjorklund, who's being treated for a bulging disc in her back, will not play. The 6-foot sophomore did some shooting and conditioning work Sunday.

"She's getting better," Moshak said. "The unfortunate thing is this isn't a quick rehab overnight."

Moshak said Bjorklund experienced some back trouble in high school but added, "there wasn't a particular incident that occurred this time, so my theory, and this is just a guess, it had to do somewhat with the volume that we've been doing, because she didn't have any real back trouble last year."

And just think, Bjorklund wasn't subjected to last Thursday's 3-hour, 15-minute workout. UT coach Pat Summitt conceded that fatigue could've been a factor in Saturday's performance.

"I'm not going to make that as an excuse,'' she said, "but I knew when I left here (Thursday) I thought: 'Well, you may have to rotate more players.' "

With the regular season underway, Tennessee's schedule won't accommodate many future marathons. Summitt will have to pick her spots.

"If we have a time frame where we have three days between games, we're going to keep the conditioning level up,'' she said.

In the meantime, Summitt will find ways to stress what she believes to be crucial to the work in progress.

"I think it's a lot about your mental approach and toughness,'' she said.

Baugh Update: Baugh, who's recovering from reconstructive knee surgery, is entering a second week of what Moshak termed "very intense weight-room workouts" after being pulled off the court last Monday because of pain.

"She's risen to the challenge,'' Moshak said of the weight-room sessions, "and it's working. It's paying off."

© 2008, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.