Everything Rick Barnes said during Tennessee Basketball media day on Thursday

Everything head coach Rick Barnes said during his press conference on Thursday as Tennessee Basketball held its media day at Food City Center:

What he learned about this Tennessee team so far

“I guess I would say versatility, maybe, that we know we got different ways we can play with different signups. Bigs, smalls somewhere in between too. But still trying to figure out what is the best way to go for the most part. Just looking to really get everyone on the court at the same time. But overall, I think we’ve got really terrific camaraderie within our team. We’ve got a group of guys, you can tell they came here to want to get better in everything we try to do. The attitude has been good. I do know that after each scrimmage we’ve gone out, we’ve got to continue to get better. We have gotten from scrimmage to scrimmage. But everybody has a way to go.”

Chaz Lanier having elite efficiency numbers last season, what goes into being an efficient scorer

“Normally, when he’s really playing his best basketball, he doesn’t mess with the ball very much. He gets to his shot, he gets where he needs to be. And it’s been a really, I think he would tell you, a unique experience for him playing with group of guys that bring the energy and effort that Jahmai and Zakai bring. Jordan Gainey has been with it too. And the standard that those guys play with every day has been a big experience for him as anything he’s gone through. And he would tell you that. He’s going to have to continue to do what he does, but do it at a much quicker pace.”

The leadership from Zakai Zeigler since he got to Tennessee, him going into his senior season 

“As you know from day one, it didn’t take long for him to establish himself in our program, our team. The face of the program, whatever that may be, it took him literally a week on campus four years ago to let know everyone he was here to compete and play at the highest level. What he does day in and day out is what makes him special. You all have watched him through the years. The way he plays the way he practices, he’s extremely hard on himself, sometimes to a fault. But there’s no one that wants to win and is going to prepare any order than Zakai. He’s going to have a great year, not just individually. The one thing that defines him is he wants to win. I think he’s done a really good job, again, with Jahmai and Jordan, trying to get the younger players and the new guys to understand that we’ve got some big holes to fill. We need those guys to play at an extremely high level.”

JP Estrella on his return from injury, if he’ll be ready for Tennessee’s season opener on November 4

“He’s doing a little bit more each day. I don’t where he is in terms of, maybe he has a good day, maybe he has a setback. We need him. But Chad (Newman has) done a great job, I think, making sure that he will be ready when the time comes. He’s also a player that needs work and reps. So they’re working him back in where he’s starting to get up and down the floor. I don’t how to answer when he’ll be (ready) or where he’ll be. Just depends on the progresses over these next couple weeks.”

If Zakai Zeigler can do anything to surprise him at this point in his career

“No, I don’t think anything he does (surprises me). I mean, it’s the expectation that he has for himself and that we have for him every day. I mean, when he has a tough day, he’s so brutally hard on himself that sometimes it makes it even tougher than it needs to be. But he’s just so competitive within himself. He wants to play the perfect game. He wants to do everything he can to get the ball where guys need it. And I think when he gets himself in trouble is when he tries to take too much on himself. He’s starting to more and more understand his teammates on this team. Like a year ago, he understood quickly, figured out how that team needed to play. This team, is not quite there yet. When Zakai gets there, the other guys will follow his lead.”

On if anyone other than JP Estrella is dealing with an injury

“Just Chaz and JP. A week ago, a week and a half ago, I think we had the flu run through the team but other than that these guys have been pretty resilient.”

On what Chaz Lanier’s injury was

“He just had an inflamed something on his foot. He has been going in and out, bringing him back, too, slowly.”

On the differing styles of Igor Milicic and Felix Okpara, the versatility that brings them

“Well, we’re different because now we’ve got— I mean Felix is a great rim protector. And I think that Cade (Phillips) has become one too. I don’t know, we have talked about it many times how two guys have competed against each other every day from going on what seems like forever. Felix and Cade go at each other in an extremely healthy way. And they both have made each other better. Both of them play above rim. Both of them are real lob threads, but both of them are shot blockers. Then you throw Igor in and he’s different than those two, but those two guys have so improved each other so much. So we’re different in the fact that we do have some legit lob threats. We have other guys that can do it. But to the extent of those two guys, not there. But other guys can do some things up on the front line in different ways. JP should be able to give us another guy that can do that once he gets back and can get his feet back and get where he can move at the pace it we’re moving at right now as the team.”

Him being on the Hall of Fame ballot last year

“Not much. I really haven’t thought about it. Again, any good thing that has happened to me has been a true blessing from God and the players that he’s blessed me with to be around. And I’ve always said the best part of this job is the daily interaction with players and watching them grow and be a part of it. And I’ve just been so blessed throughout my career with so many wonderful players and coaches that have been with me. But any individual award really when you’re in a team sport comes from the success of the team. But again, I’m just blessed to be here and so many blessings with so many wonderful people in my life.”

Tennessee having defensive minded players like Felix Okpara and Jahmai Mashack

“Well, there’s really three, I mean, a list came out, someone told me last week that they rated three of our guys as the top three defensive players in the country. In Jahmai, Z(akai) and Felix. And they definitely create some good situations for us on the other end. And the question will be, and we talk about as a team, who’s going to keep coming to join that group? Because we lost two really good defenders in Santi and Josiah and we need some other guys to really step in there and fill that void along with really all the way down the line. Now I do think that Jordan has gotten much better defensively but we need some more. We need Cade to continue to improve there because what Josiah did defensively with his hands was something that we miss. He got his hands on so many balls and broke things away and so we could get out and turn people over and we need to get that from not just our frontline guys, but our perimeter guys as well.”

Where Tennessee is defensively after losing some key veterans

“Not where we need to be. Not where we need to be. Getting closer but not there yet. Guys understanding to do their work early can eliminate a lot of the problems. Too many guys still check out a little bit and are always playing catch up as opposed to doing the work early. Knowing if something’s gonna happen and within our principles it’s hard to get to sometimes with the way we run offense, but it can be done. But it’s got to be tough mentally. You got to have some real cardio toughness and you’ve got to stay alert. And right now we’ve got too many guys away from the ball not staying in tune with— player watching (the ball) probably more than anything and not reacting to the basketball.”

Why he thinks the Tennessee offense won’t take a step back without Dalton Knecht

“I do think the versatility and we’ve worked hard in a lot of different areas. We’re really happy with where we’re moving with our inside game and guys that we can move forward and throw it to. In the past people pretty much (said) that we’re gonna let you play two-on-two those Zakai and a post guy and I think we made really good strides there because of how hard our post guys (are playing) and we know what Zakai is going to do and Jordan. Another guy that you know that has really in the last two weeks, he got off to a great start this summer is Bishop (Boswell) really was playing well, then Zakai came back and that’s a whole new experience for him having to deal with Zakai every single day. But the last two weeks he’s made as much strides defensively as anybody on our team and he’s highly competitive. He wants to win. He’s still trying to figure out what we’re doing from an offensive situation, but defensively his effort, his rebounding has been really impressive the last few weeks.”

How he has seen Jahmai Mashack’s shot improve over the Tennessee’s offseason

“Well he has. I mean, he’s worked on it really for four years and you know, he’s a guy now that when he takes the shots that we know that he practices and gets set, we’re really surprised if he misses them as long as he does what he practices. He’s worked hard at it and we need him to do that. And if he’s open, he knows he’s worked hard enough to be a guy that we expect to shoot open shots when he gets them and he’s done a good job. He really has. I think pretty much through the preseason, he’s probably been our (most) consistent three-point shooter overall.”

His approach to helping Tennessee transfers acclimate to the program

“I think you gotta coach everybody the same way, but obviously you are hoping with them being older, that they can pick up things quicker. You hope that they’ve seen a lot of different things in their time in college basketball. We don’t slow down. We’re not gonna wait really for anybody and we expect them to figure it out pretty quickly. We’re going to do what we need to do from our end, but we also expect them to do what they need to do from their film study, their individual film study and different things so they know coming in, what the expectations are and what we expect from ’em. And we always talk about versatility and being able to, (the) more positions you can play allows you to probably be able to get more minutes. But we don’t lower the expectation for ’em. We’ve got a probably higher bar than they’ve ever had and we really expect ’em to live up to it.”

Where Tennessee sophomore guard Cameron Carr is

“Pro Day the other day, he shot the ball well. There’s still some of the fundamental things he’s gotta continue to work with, but you know, he’s a guy that what when we look at his ability, we’ve got extremely high standards for him. He’s a guy that we feel should be an outstanding defensive player. Still gotta take care of the ball better than he does, but he’s improved. I think Cm over the last two and a half weeks have made strides to really try to simplify things, making it easier on himself by not trying to overdo things.

“And we know that again, he’s one of those guys that when he gets his feet set and not rushed, he’ll shoot the ball at a higher percentage, but he’s no different than anybody else on our team right now. We talk about taking care of the ball and being able to finish the possession defensively and offensively the way we want to. And he is getting better. He is. We need him to get there quicker and so we’re gonna push him to get there.”

How his offensive philosophy has changed over the last five years or so

“I don’t know about we’ve changed, we always adjust. I will say that we’re constantly adjusting. I mean, even a year ago — this time a year ago, we had no idea Dalton (Knecht) would do what he did. I mean, we knew that he had the ability offensively to do some things that we hadn’t had, but where he was defensively, I mean, I’m telling you, I would tell him, ‘Hey, I don’t care how many times you score the ball if you’re gonna give up that many points, what are we doing here? We’re just trading your baskets for their baskets.’ And you know, what we didn’t know was how hard he was willing to work. Players will make coaches adjust. Good players, make coaches adjust, they will. And it could happen this year. Like we — at the end of the year — we ended up doing things that we hadn’t even thought about doing this time of year. But from the way the season settled in, the way we started growing as a team and where we started doing things, we added stuff to try to take advantage of different guys. And I would imagine that’s gonna happen with this team. I’m not sure exactly who with yet, but I know it needs to happen with this team. So we need some guys to show us consistently what we can count on every time they go out there. And as a coaching staff, we’ll make the necessary adjustments to take advantage of it.”