Tennessee
Zakai Zeigler on his Madison Square Garden homecoming: Every moment meant something
Every step Zakai Zeigler took on the court at Madison Square Garden brought back a memory Tuesday. And they weren’t good ones.
Tennessee’s senior point guard kept going back to two years ago, when the Vols came to New York for the Sweet 16 against Florida Atlantic. Zeigler was only a couple weeks removed from having surgery to repair a torn ACL.
“I remember (in) my head like, the last time I was here, I was on a scooter, rolling around,” Zeigler said Tuesday night. “Just being able to walk that hallway, being able to warm up, every moment out there just meant something to me.”
Zeigler made every moment count in one final homecoming with Tennessee. The Long Island native scored 13 points, had nine assists and grabbed five rebounds while leading the No. 1 team in college basketball to a 75-62 win over Miami in the Jimmy V Classic.
“It’s been a tough journey,” Zeigler said, “but no matter what, my mom always told me to be a fighter and never give up. And everything is part of God’s plan.
“So all the ups and downs in life, no matter what, I’m just thankful to be in position I’m in today.”
Rick Barnes on Zakai Zeigler: ‘I wouldn’t trade him for anybody’
Zeigler was on the floor at The Garden as a freshman in December 2021 in the Jimmy V Classic, coming off the bench to score nine points, with two rebounds, an assist and a steal, in 29 minutes during an ugly 57-52 overtime loss to Texas Tech.
His sophomore season ended with a torn ACL in Tennessee’s final home game of the regular season.
He had surgery and was away from the team while the Vols beat Louisiana and Duke in Orlando in the opening weekend of the NCAA Tournament, then rejoined his teammates a week later for the East Regional semifinal in New York.
Tennessee led by as many as nine points in the first half, but was outscored by 12 after halftime as ninth-seeded Florida Atlantic’s Cinderella run to the Final Four sent the Vols home.
“I remember the game and it was pretty tough to watch, honestly,” Zeigler said. “I’m a sore loser.”
Zakai Zeigler this season: 12.1 points, 8.0 assists, 3.2 rebounds, 2.0 steals per game
This Tennessee team hasn’t lost yet, off to a 9-0 start — the program’s best winning nine straight to start the 2000-01 season — with Zeigler as the front man. He’s averaging 12.1 points, 8.0 assists, 3.2 rebounds and 2.0 steals in a team-high 33.2 minutes per game.
“I wouldn’t trade him for anybody,” Tennessee coach Rick Barnes said. “ … He has been incredible. His DNA, how he’s impacted our program is unlike many players can ever do. And I’m just happy that we’re able to get him back here to New York, being his senior year, because I know he knows what The Garden is about.
“He knows it’s a stage instead of court. And just getting him back here is really special for him.”
On Tuesday night it was a stage Zeigler got to star on in front of friends and family — at long last.
“Being able to come back here,” Zeigler said, “and get a win in front of a lot of hometown friends, family, my grandmother’s here, some people that haven’t got to see my teammates play since high school maybe, it was really meaningful for me, honestly, being able to get that win today and see everybody out there.”
Tennessee baseball received a commitment from UC Irvine pitcher Ricky Ojeda on June 19.
Ojeda, who is eligible for the MLB draft in July, announced his decision on social media. He visited Tennessee on June 15-16.
The lefthanded Ojeda had a strong 2026 season primarily as a reliever, posting a 3.77 ERA with 62 strikeouts and 20 walks in 62 innings. In 2025, he became the first reliever to be named Big West Pitcher of the Year after going 13-1 with a 3.55 ERA and 83 strikeouts in 66 innings, which also earned him a third-team all-American nod from the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association and Perfect Game.
Whether Ojeda makes it to Tennessee remains an open question. Perfect Game ranked him as the No. 179 prospect for the draft. That would place him in the sixth round.
Should Ojeda join the staff, however, he would instantly become one of the team’s top options out of a bullpen that struggled immensely in 2026. The pitching staff is also under new leadership under pitching coach Austin Knight, who was hired from ECU.
Ojeda is the fourth player to announce they will transfer to Tennessee this offseason, joining two-way Mercer transfer Braydon Kersey, Northwestern State pitcher Brody Trosclair and Air Force infielder Wyatt Hanoian.
Who’s leaving Tennessee baseball
- UTL Jay Abernathy (Oklahoma)
- RHP Nic Abraham
- INF Ariel Antigua (Arizona)
- INF Finley Bates
- RHP Ari Bethea
- OF Hutson Chance
- RHP Sawyer Deering (San Diego State)
- OF Nate Eisfelder
- 1B Evan Hankins (Virginia Tech)
- UTL Hunter High
- RHP Brayden Krenzel (Arkansas)
- INF Manny Marin
- INF Ethan Moore (Missouri)
- UTL Chris Newstrom
- LHP Taylor Tracey
- C Cash Williams (West Virginia)
Who’s joining Tennessee baseball
- RHP/DH Braydon Kersey
- LHP Brody Trosclair
- INF Wyatt Hanoian
- LHP Ricky Ojeda
Emmett Siegel covers Tennessee baseball for Knox News. Email: emmett.siegel@knoxnews.com; X: @EmmettSiegel_
JACKSON, Tenn. (WBBJ) – An exciting day of sporting clays in West Tennessee is doubling as a major fight against hunger.
Today’s “Shooting Hunger” event took place at the Carroll County Shooting Sports Park in Huntingdon. It’s a partnership between Tennessee Farm Bureau, Tennessee Farmers Co-Op, Farm Credit Mid-America and Rural First.
Since 2015, Shooting Hunger has helped provide more than three million meals to Tennesseans with money going to food banks, backpack programs, and local hunger relief. A $500 scholarship will also go to the top youth shooter in each flight.
“We’re joining together to raise money for school backpacks to feed hungry kids. We do these, we actually do three of these across the state of Tennessee so at the end of the day we take, we take all the money we put it into a pile and when we divide equally amongst all 95 counties across the state of Tennessee,“ said Bryan Wright, executive vice president for the Tennessee Farm Bureau.
Organizers say events like this matter because one in six children in Tennessee struggle with hunger.
Copyright 2026 WBBJ. All rights reserved.
Tennessee director of track and field Duane Ross gauged the hunger of the men’s 4×100-meter relay team to pull off the upset.
“They said, ‘Coach, we’re going to win,’ ” Ross said. “When they bring you that much confidence, you can grab your popcorn and enjoy the meet.”
No popcorn was consumed, but the appetite was there from the start.
Traunard Folson, Davonte Howell, T’Mars McCallum and Elijah Clark finished in a school record time of 37.98 seconds at the NCAA Outdoor Championships on June 12 in Eugene, Oregon. It was the the program’s first national title in the 4×100 since 1983 and the fourth-fastest in NCAA history.
Four other relay teams never crossed the line. Auburn, the two-time defending champion, had run an NCAA-record 37.75 in the semifinal, but had a botched handoff on the last exchange. Arkansas, the reigning SEC champion, also dropped its baton, along with Oregon and Houston.
McCallum said staying clean through a race of chaos starts with a focus on winning, even in practice.
“In the moment we can’t really worry about anything else, just what we can control,” McCallum said on June 18. “We came to practice every time with the idea of, ‘OK, we’ve got to make sure this is fixed, because we know if we run that time, we can win.’ “
It was the final event of McCallum’s college career. It didn’t fully hit until the long flight home to Knoxville.
“I was like, we really did it,” he said. “Now we have a school record, the first team to ever go under 38 seconds here.”
Whether belief had anything to do with what went wrong in those four other lanes isn’t something Tennessee’s runners can answer. It’s exactly what they point to for why theirs didn’t.
Clark, a freshman who ran the anchor leg, said winning was just a matter of starting the race.
“We knew we had it the whole time,” he said. “No matter who did what, what happened, we knew what the outcome would come to.”
Ross said the victory wasn’t a surprise inside the program either.
“I wouldn’t say unsung,” Ross said. “I’ve watched this team all year long, and we were expecting to come out of there with the championship. It was a tight competition down to the last event.”
Tennessee finished third in the men’s team standings with 46 points, its best total since 2002.
Howell, a junior who ran the second leg, said the belief behind the relay team’s confidence was built long before the race.
“Three of the four of us already ran under 10 seconds,” he said. “Last year we all trained together during the summer, all lived together. We already had the bond, and adding the freshman on anchor was just a cherry on top. He figured it out at SECs, ran a 10.1, season’s best, and we trusted him to bring it home.”
Clark said the title is already part of something bigger to him.
“The goal is to always make history,” said Clark, who was hired by Tennessee four years ago after a successful run at North Carolina A&T. “It’s been one of my dreams. To be able to be on the wall, especially at a school like this, I couldn’t ask for anything more.”
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