{"id":278181,"date":"2025-10-04T22:51:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T22:51:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/278181\/"},"modified":"2025-10-04T22:51:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T22:51:10","slug":"why-tennessee-is-a-dark-horse-candidate-for-the-final-four","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/278181\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Tennessee is a ‘dark horse candidate’ for the Final Four"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s hard to imagine a college basketball team coming off back-to-back Elite Eight seasons and still managing to sneak up should they flirt with the Final Four for a third straight year. But for Tennessee Basketball<\/a>, Jon Rothstein<\/strong><\/a> believes that to be the case.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The college basketball analyst this week listed the Vols as one of his five dark-horse candidates to reach the Final Four<\/a>, alongside San Diego State, UCLA, Iowa State and Arkansas.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYou might say Jon, how can you put Tennessee as a dark horse candidate for the Final Four when they\u2019ve made it the Elite Eight each of the last two season?\u201d Rothstein said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s real simple. How many teams are able to go to the most hallowed showcase in college basketball, the Final Four, and play during the first weekend in April, when you lose three players from the perimeter the year prior? That\u2019s the undertaking that Tennessee is going to go through this year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ja\u2019Kobi Gillespie replaces Zakai Zeigler at point guard<\/p>\n

Senior point guard Zakai Zeigler<\/a><\/strong> graduated. So did Chaz Lanier<\/a><\/strong>, Tennessee\u2019s new single-season 3-point record holder. So did Jordan Gainey<\/a><\/strong>, one of the best sixth men in the country the last two seasons, and Jahmai Mashack<\/a><\/strong>, one of the best perimeter defenders in the game and a player Rothstein described as \u201cthe best glue guy in college basketball last season.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cBut with that said, you still have Rick Barnes<\/a><\/strong>,\u201d Rothstein said. \u201cAnd you still have what he brings to the table.\u201d<\/p>\n

After striking gold in the NCAA Transfer Portal with Lanier last season and Dalton Knecht<\/a><\/strong> in 2023-24, Tennessee added one of the best point guards in the country out of the portal in Ja\u2019Kobi Gillepsie<\/a><\/strong>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201c(He) was the heartbeat of last season\u2019s team at Maryland that went to the Sweet 16 and lost to Florida,\u201d Rothstein said of Gillespie, \u201c(and) will fit in seamlessly for Zakai Zeigler<\/a><\/strong>. And when I forecasted the SEC over the summer and I had my all-SEC preseason first team, Ja\u2019Kobi Gillespie<\/a><\/strong> was on the team. You also, especially if Rick Barnes<\/a><\/strong> is your coach, want to be anchored by a sturdy presence in the post. Tennessee has that in Felix Okpara.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo the million dollar question comes then, are you going to get enough perimeter scoring to complement your all-conference point guard and your all-conference big man?\u201d<\/p>\n

5-star freshman Nate Ament is \u2018the wild card\u2019 for Tennessee<\/p>\n

Enter Nate Ament<\/a><\/strong>, the five-star freshman, the consensus top-five prospect in the 2025 recruiting rankings and a possible top-five pick in next summer\u2019s NBA Draft.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s why Nate Ament<\/a><\/strong> is the wild card for Tennessee,\u201d Rothstein said, \u201cthe five-star freshman. He does not need to obviously have the pressure on him where he is going to solely be responsible for whether or not he gets Tennessee to the Final Four for the first time in program history, but he\u2019s going to have a big hand in it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cPhysically, he\u2019s got gifts from God. He\u2019s long, he\u2019s wiry, he looks like a prototypical wing that Norman Rockwell would have painted if you were looking at it. But he\u2019s also going to adjust to what was the best conference in college basketball last year as a freshman. Keep the expectations at a reasonable level out of the gate.\u201d<\/p>\n

And get reliable production from him in March, when it matters most.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf he\u2019s a guy and he can regularly get Tennessee 14-15 points during the NCAA Tournament in 2026,\u201d Rothstein said, \u201cTennessee again under Rick Barnes<\/a><\/strong> is going to be a candidate to go to the Final Four.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s hard to imagine a college basketball team coming off back-to-back Elite Eight seasons and still managing to…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":278182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[1339,1317,1337,1338,1718,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-278181","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-basketball","11":"tag-ncaabasketball","12":"tag-regwall","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115318350598667509","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/278182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}