Why Rick Barnes turned to Zakai Zeigler to be his Tennessee basketball enforcer

There’s nothing imposing about Zakai Zeigler. Tennessee’s junior point guard is listed at 5-foot-9. He checks in at 171 pounds. But when Rick Barnes needed an enforcer, Zeigler is where he turned.

“In all honesty,” Barnes said Saturday night, “I told him that I thought he had to change his demeanor.”

Coming off a disappointing 63-59 loss to South Carolina Tuesday night at South Carolina, Barnes was looking to address some hard truths. And he needed some help.

“We can’t be a team that when we’re down,” Barnes said, “(we’re) saying to each other, ‘we’re good, we’re good’ when it’s not good. I said, we’ve got to be transparent.”

Zeigler was his pick to be one of the truth tellers, one of the players Barnes wants to be as obsessed about details and accountability as the head coach is.

Zakai Zeigler: “I’m the guy that’s supposed to be driving this car”

There was an obvious change Friday afternoon inside Thompson-Boling Arena, when Barnes and his Tennessee coaching staff started barking at their players as soon as they hit the floor for practice.

There was a tone being set. The Vols couldn’t lose anymore games they should win. But the message couldn’t be coming from the coaches alone.

“I told him I think he’s one of the best point guards in the country,” Barnes said. “But I told him, the whole team at some point in time, I can’t be the only guy getting on guys. I said, you’ve got to do that.”

Barnes didn’t have to tell Zeigler twice.

“The last two days,” Barnes continued, “he did a great job where he took it on himself. He said, ‘Hey, I’m the guy that’s supposed to be driving this car, and I’m going to make sure that guys are doing what they’re supposed to do when they’re supposed to do it and if not, I’m going to let them know about it.’”

Zeigler was firmly in the driver seat in No. 6 Tennessee’s 103-92 win at Kentucky Saturday night, posting career highs with 26 points and 13 rebounds to go with three steals and a couple rebounds.

After going 0-for-6 from the field and finishing with just two points in the loss to South Carolina, Zeigler started 5-for-5 from the field and 4-for-4 from the 3-point line at Kentucky. 

Zeigler said he took the message from Barnes “on the chin” but viewed it as a sign of both respect and trust. 

“That he trusts me with the older guys,” Zeigler said, “to keep them under control and stuff.”

Up Next: No. 6 Tennessee vs. LSU, Wednesday, 7 p.m. ET, SEC Network

When Kentucky had what was as much as a 14-point Tennessee lead in the first half down to one early in the second half at Rupp Arena, Zeigler stayed poised and focused on keeping the game under control.

“He trusts me with that,” Zeigler said. “Just to have that confidence, it means a lot.”

Josiah-Jordan James, who had his own career-high with 26 points to snap out of his weeks-long shooting slump, described the message from Barnes going beyond just Zeigler. Accountability falls to everyone in the program.  

“We all came … here trying to prove something,” James said. “Prove that we’re better than the last game against South Carolina.”

It just so happened Zeigler set the tone, just like Barnes asked him to do.

“I feel like he set it off from the jump,” James said. “I feel like we fought for 40 minutes and it really started with him on both ends of the floor.”