Sophomore DeWayne Brown II enters his second season at Tennessee.
Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes discussed the 6-foot-8, 248-pound forward returning to the Vols for the 2026-27 basketball season and his expectations for Brown II.
"A lot," Barnes said at SEC media day on Tuesday in Birmingham, Alabama. "We expect a lot because last year he was the biggest surprise on our basketball team. We talk about it with our players once we get everybody together. We always tell them that somebody is going to surprise us and somebody is going to disappoint us. Last year DeWayne was the biggest surprise. We certainly, more than anything, appreciated his loyalty. He was the one guy, along with Troy Henderson, that's back, but we knew that we wanted DeWayne Brown
back because he stands for everything that any coach would want. Just a great character person, a guy that works hard every day. He's the ultimate team player. We're going to ask him to do a lot more.
"We went back, and as we bring recruits in and start showing them highlight tapes and show them plays and situations where they might be in, it dawns on us every time that DeWayne Brown was part of those clips even a year ago. We expect him to do more. He's got himself in even better shape. I don't think we would be as far along with this group right now if it weren't for DeWayne. I wish Troy would have had all summer, but he didn't, recovering from his shoulder surgery, but once he came back, those two guys know what we'd like to see every day in practice, have really done a lot with their leadership from just the way they go about every day in practice."
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This article originally appeared on Vols Wire: Rick Barnes details expectations for sophomore DeWayne Brown II
