Tennessee freshman guard Troy Henderson has played sporadically when Rick Barnes has needed him over the past several weeks. On Tuesday night against Texas A&M, he played like a starter in the second half and in overtime minutes.
The former overlooked 3-star prospect drilled some of the biggest shots of the night, helping to force overtime and get Tennessee in position to steal a win. The Volunteers trailed just about the entire game against the Aggies, but a late run gave Tennessee a win that they
badly needed after starting 1-2 in SEC play. Henderson, shockingly enough, was a huge reason why.
“Troy got his most significant minutes and I thought his three was a huge three and (he) played with the kind of confidence that we liked,” Rick Barnes said after the win on Tuesday.
Down two with 1:28 to play, Henderson — who clearly doesn’t lack confidence — nailed this triple to give Tennessee a late lead. We’ve seen this from Henderson here and there and we know he can shoot, but to do it in this spot out of the blue was a different story entirely.
Henderson didn’t play in the SEC opener against Arkansas. He had just six and eight minutes against Florida and Texas. Against Texas A&M? Henderson logged 22 minutes and put up eight big points and two steals.
“We told him the same thing we’ve told all these guys,” Barnes said. “The guys that aren’t playing, take care of the ball, play defense, get lost in the game that way and then let your offense just come and just do what we practice and you’ll be fine. Why it took him a little bit longer than some, I don’t know.”
Henderson was the 237th player in last year’s recruiting cycle, according to the 247Sports Composite rankings. The 6-1, 180 pound guard reminded plenty of the story of Zakai Zeigler, who came to Tennessee with a similar billing. While Henderson hasn’t forced his way onto the floor quite as early as Zeigler did, he may have just announced his arrival on Tuesday night.
“And now the question would be, how does he handle success,” Barnes said. “Can he come back and decide he is going to — he knows he can do it, but will he do it consistently?”
The rotation here is interesting for Barnes, particularly with Nate Ament responding so well to his minutes at the four spot. With Ament down there, Tennessee went smaller. Instead of adding Ethan Burg, Amaree Abram or Amari Evans to the lineup, Barnes ended up going with Henderson almost exclusively down the stretch. Just based on how this year has gone, that will probably be a game by game decision.
One thing is for sure though, Tennessee has an added piece of guard depth that not many were counting on for this season. Henderson looks like a pretty nice future piece, too.
