INDIANAPOLIS — Rick Barnes has coached a lot of really good defensive teams in his long head coaching career. But this year’s Tennessee basketball team has something that no other Barnes’ coached team has coached: two finalists for the Naismith Defensive Player of the Year award.
Zakai Zeigler and Jahmai Mashack are two of the award’s four finalists alongside Creighton’s Ryan Kalkbrenner and Houston’s Joseph Tugler. Both Zeigler and Mashack are deserving of the award. Which player would those inside the Tennessee program vote for?
“Man, what kind of question is that?” junior center Felix Okpara asked in response.
“I’m not answering that question,” walk-on Grant Hurst said. “That’s impossible.”
“You can’t put me on the spot like that,” senior guard Jordan Gainey said. “I don’t know. I can’t answer that.”
“That’s such a hard question,” sophomore center JP Estrella said.
Firm answers were hard to come by. Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes said he’d split his vote and give a half to each player. It’s an extremely difficult proposition because of the way both players affect the game in different ways.
“Both go about it a different way,” Barnes said. “You got one guy that is having to match up every night with normally the other team’s best player. Then you got a guy like Zakai who’s playing 94 feet and getting ball screened every time he turns around. So it’s two different ways that you look at it, but it’s really a compliment to both of them.”
Most players approached the question the same way as Barnes and didn’t provide a firm answer. But a few did give answers and all of them sided with Mashack for differing reason.
“I’m going to give it to Jahmai because Zakai already won SEC Defensive Player of the Year. Even it out,” Estrella said.
“I’m going Jahmai only because in practice Z be guarding me and he can’t guard me,” senior wing Darlinstone Dubar said.
“If both can’t win it … That’s a tough question,” Okpara said. “I’d go Jahmai.”
Mashack doesn’t have the flashy stats. His 57 steals are impressive but are not near the top nationally. The same is true of his 20 blocks. That’s an impressive feat for a 6-foot-4 guard but isn’t a number that gets anyone in a defensive player of the year conversation.
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Despite gaudy stats, Mashack is one of the four finalists for the award because of how he takes opposing guards out of the game.
“If you go out and ask every coach who they fear on the basketball court most guarding their best player that’s a guard, one through three, it’s probably Jahmai Mashack,” Hurst said.
“I see Jahmai in practice, the things he talks about and he’s so detailed oriented when it comes to, and he’s always guarding the best player on the team, and the things that he talks about in practice about reading gaps and angles and stuff,” Estrella said. “Sometimes I’m like ‘what are you talking about?’ and it translates to exactly what we need to happen.”
The senior shooting guard and a All-SEC Defensive Team selection, Mashack made his case for the award with simple and sound logic.
“Just watch me,” Mashack said. “Just watch me on the court, you see how I play. I honestly don’t think there is a case. I think I got it. Don’t tell Zakai that though. … I’m a guy that, you don’t look at steals. You don’t look at blocks. You use your eyes, you trust your eyes.”
“If you really watch a game, you know that he’s the best defender in the country,” Gainey said. “He’ll lock up everyone’s best player.”
Making the case for Zeigler to win national defensive player of the year isn’t difficult either. The “head of the snake” for Tennessee’s defense, Zeigler’s 69 steals were the third most in the SEC this season when he went on to win SEC Defensive Player of the Year for the second straight season.
The 5-foot-9 point guard sets the tone for Tennessee defensively and makes everything difficult on Volunteer opponents.
“You watch that dude play, he’s fighting over a bunch of screens,” Mashack said of Zeigler. “Guarding 94-feet causing a bunch of havoc. He’s everywhere on the floor. I think him being able to be in passing lanes and pressure ball handlers … I can’t imagine having to deal with that for 40 minutes all game. It’s crazy.”
“He’s 5-foot-9 and you fear him more than anyone else on the court,” Hurst said. “He’s got a heart that outweighs everything about him in size and stature. It’s hard but no one else on that board has won a defensive player of the year and is still playing other than Z.”
Tennessee needs Zeigler and Mashack to be at the top of their defensive game on Friday night when the Vols face off against a Kentucky team that gave their defense issues in the regular season. Tipoff from Lucas Oil Stadium is at 7:39 p.m. ET and both TBS and TruTv are broadcasting the game.
