Tennessee stresses that there isn’t pressure in playing in Knoxville, but that isn’t the full truth.
By Logan Starkey
Pressure is privilege: a simple phrase that rings through the men’s basketball program at Tennessee.
Alumni, coaches, recruits and players alike say it over and over and over. The phrase is ingrained in the culture of the program.
But culture doesn’t change reality. The expectation to win is something athletes on the team shoulder as they begin their quest towards March.
National Expectations
When the AP’s preseason men’s basketball poll was released on Oct. 13, the Volunteers were ranked at No. 18. This is a program that has made the Elite Eight the last two seasons, though, and assistant coach Greg Polinsky once again believes his team could be in the mix for a national championship.
“We have enough talent to compete nationally,” said Polinsky. “There’s expectations, that’s a good thing, that’s healthy.”
These expectations come off the back of a strong offseason in recruiting. The team added three top 110 high school recruits, according to 247 Sports’ player rankings.
DeWayne Brown, a center from Hoover, Alabama, is one of those incoming freshmen.
Brown joined a veteran heavy frontcourt that also includes returners JP Estrella, Cade Phillips, and Felix Okpara. Transfer portal addition Jaylen Carey from in-state rival Vanderbilt added depth.
For Brown, the talent on the roster created added challenges as he attempted to earn his spot in the starting lineup, despite coming in as a four-star recruit.
“The intensity of practice, every day you have to come to get better regardless of what you’re doing,” Brown said. “No matter what you’re doing. On the court, weight room, even off the court at team events is just teaching you to be a pro. When they do that it gets you in the mindset where you have to get it done.”
Brown proved more than ready for the challenge.
In just 13 minutes against Duke on Oct. 26, he notched 10 points and six rebounds. He went 5/5 from the field. He then posted six points and five rebounds in fifteen minutes against Mercer on Nov. 3 with no misses from the field.
That was the moment head coach Rick Barnes decided Brown was a part of his team’s long-term plans: Brown and fellow freshman Troy Henderson would be athletes to watch this season.
“They’re gonna be in there [the rotation],” Barnes said in the post-game press conference. “They’ve earned it. The more they play the better they’re gonna get.”
Travel
Earning a spot in the lineup isn’t the only pressure Brown has faced as a freshman on a national-caliber team. He’s also managing travel and school, forcing the young star to be mindful of his schedule as he adjusts to the spotlight.
“I would say really the biggest transition has been trying to manage your time,” said Brown. “In high school, you’re not really asked to do as much as you are in college, and then of course, the difficulty of practice.”
Time is something Brown doesn’t have much of, particularly as the non-conference and early-season tournament schedule ramps up for the Vols. Last season, the Tennessee men’s basketball team traveled 11,662 miles while the Lady Vols basketball team put in 10,494 travel miles in the 24-35 season. The farthest trip for the men this year will be a nearly 2,000-mile trip to Las Vegas to compete in the Player Era Men’s Championship. Five days after the scheduled end of that tournament, the team travels to play the Syracuse Orange in New York. Between those two trips alone, accounting for the return trip to Knoxville, the team will amass over 5,600 miles, almost half of the distance they traveled the entirety of last season, in just over one week.
Relationships, Relationships, Relationships,
Though Brown faced early stress in his first months on Rocky Top, there was a bright side: the front-court depth meant Brown was able to curate relationships with both senior leaders like Felix Okpara and his fellow freshmen.
“Felix [Okpara], on the court he’s always real talkative,” Brown said. “If I don’t understand something he’ll always try to explain it to me. Even if we’re at the gym at the same time, if he sees me doing something I shouldn’t be doing or sees something he knows I can improve on, he’ll try to help me with that. He tries to talk me through the play. He’s been really helpful for me.”
The mentor-mentee relationships on the men’s basketball team aren’t just one way though. Brown’s efforts to learn and grow under the leadership of the veterans have caught his teammates’ attention. In fact, after Tennessee beat Mercer, another Vol senior, Estrella, made sure to credit Brown for his improvement and commitment to the program.
“DeWayne [Brown] came in and offensively, [did a] great job,” Estrella said in the post-game press conference. “Defensively a great job. He shows up everyday in practice, so I’m really not surprised he shows up that way in games.”
Brown values the leadership of his teammates, and he knows their support will be essential as UT makes another push for a national title. Expectations are high, but that’s how they’re supposed to be, according to Polinsky.
That’s the nature of basketball at Tennessee.