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Rick Barnes on what makes Zakai Zeigler special: 'He just wants to get it right all the time'

IMG_3593by: Grant Ramey01/12/25GrantRamey
Zakai Zeigler, Tennessee Basketball | Aaron E. Martinez/American-Statesman / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
(Aaron E. Martinez/American-Statesman / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images) Tennessee guard Zakai Zeigler (5) reacts as his team takes a larger lead over the Texas Longhorns in the game at the Moody Center on Saturday, Jan. 11, 2025.

Rick Barnes was met with resistance when he wanted to take Zakai Zeigler out of the game Tuesday night at Florida. Never mind that No. 1 Tennessee was limping to the finish line in a 30-point loss.

The senior point guard doesn’t give up easily. 

“He didn’t want to come out of the game,” Barnes said Saturday night after Tennessee’s 74-70 bounce-back win at Texas. “He just said, ‘Coach, I’m not quitting.’ We were down whatever, 30, whatever it was.”

The harder things get, the harder Zeigler tries to fix it.

He played 36 minutes in the disastrous 73-43 loss at Florida, finishing with 10 points, two rebounds and an assists. 

“He’s so hard on himself,” Barnes said. “He just wants to get it right all the time.” 

Zakai Zeigler in the second half at Texas: 13 points, five assists

Zeigler was right in winning time Saturday night at the Moody Center in Austin. He scored 13 of his 16 points and had five of his eight assists in the second half, helping the Vols rally in the final six minutes for a much-needed win after trailing for much of the second half. 

“When we were able to start scoring, we opened it up a little bit and just started driving the ball,” Barnes said. “And Zakai I thought made some great (decisions … we just put them there and said, we’re going to space the floor and let the little guy go. And he did it.”

The “little guy” is half through a career year leading the Vols. Zeigler is averaging 11.9 points, 7.6 assists and 3.6 rebounds in 34.1 minutes per game, all career highs. He’s doing it despite shooting 37.9% from the floor and just 29.0% from the 3-point line, a career low.

“When things aren’t going well,” Barnes said, “he’s going to bear down more. Which sometimes works against him. But it’s in his DNA. It’s who he is. It’s how he grew up.”

Rick Barnes: ‘The fact is he wants to play and he’s special’

Barnes said he made that point to his team recently. No one in that locker room grew up the way Zeigler did, the head coach told his players.  

“And that fight in him, that DNA,” Barnes said, “I wish I could bottle it.” 

It’s what made Barnes offer Zeigler a scholarship in the summer of 2021 — a tough showing at Peach Jam that year earned the offer, with an official visit and a commitment and signing quickly following — and what he has seen every day since then. 

“First time I saw him, he’s the same,” Barnes said. “What you see him do here, he does every day in practice. 

“Right now, we realize we got to try to rest him as much in practice as we can because I love playing point guards a lot of minutes, but the fact is he wants to play and he’s special.”

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