Unselfish Play Catapults Tennessee To Record-Setting Performance

Tennessee played a team brand of basketball on Saturday afternoon, willing the Volunteers to a blowout win over South Carolina.

The Volunteers are one of the hottest teams in college basketball. They dominated South Carolina on Saturday afternoon with a winning formula that has willed them into the top 10.

Tennessee doesn't necessarily have one superstar. They certainly have NBA talent with high upside, but the team plays together under head coach Rick Barnes's system. 

Regular season teams rely on a Naismith Player of the Year candidate; however, the teams that make it the furthest in March tend to have several contributors that make life difficult for the opposition.

The Volunteers won by 43 points and set a record for the biggest road halftime lead in the Barnes era. While they set several program marks, only one player scored 20+ points, begging the question: how did the Volunteers pull this off?

Each player has a role on this Tennessee basketball team. For instance, guard Zakai Zeigler didn't dominate the stat sheet against the Gamecocks but got the Volunteers into the right half-court sets and knew how to distribute the basketball.

Zeigler jumpstarted fast breaks by playing the passing lanes and ensured his big men got the ball on the block at their favorite spot. He didn't run isolation at the top of the key or waste shot clock; Zeigler merely played his role.

Forward Olivier Nkamhoua led the show with 21 points and ten rebounds, making all ten of his shots. However, even Nkamhoua played within the system. 

The Volunteers started the contest scorching from beyond the arc. South Carolina adjusted and began to close out on shooters quickly. Therefore, Zeigler would quickly get to the elbow and throw a pass inside to Nkamhoua.

While Nkamhoua could have played the hot hand and kept shooting, he routinely made the extra pass outside to open shooters, who either took the three or swung it around the arc for a higher percentage look.

Forward Josiah Jordan-James looked good in his second game returning from injury. He made several tough fallaways with a hand in his face, looking like the player we knew before he missed five games with an injury.

Again, Tennessee has winning basketball players with professional futures. That makes what they are accomplishing all the more meaningful because extraordinary things can happen when you get talent to mesh within an environment.

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