As Tennessee basketball soared to the heights of No. 1 in the country, players such as Chaz Lanier, Zakai Zeigler and Igor Milicic Jr. have primarily stole the headlines.

However, one of the key cogs for the Vols, senior Jahmai Mashack, has also been pivotal in the 9-0 start.

This has caught the attention of former Marquette, Indiana and Georgia head coach Tom Crean. He took to his X (formerly Twitter) account to say, 'the level of incredible defensive awareness, quickness, strength and recovery speed that Jahmai Mashack ⁦@JahmaiM⁩ brings is as elite as it gets. His shot is improving and his relentlessness is non stop.'

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While it can be tough to properly grade defenders with just counting stats, Mashack's already fit the bill. He's up to 2.1 steals per game to go with 0.7 blocks.

On offense, he's contributed 6.6 points and 1.4 assists per match to go along with 4.6 rebounds.

With Tennessee missing J.P. Estrella for the remainder of the season, the 6-foot-4 senior has also managed to step up to help defend the post.

"If you have 15 guys, he's valuable," Vols assistant coach Rod Clark said on Thursday. "But Jahmai, he can go all day. He's one of those basketball players that can be exhausted but still can think, can still make plays, can still read the offense, can tip-off what they're running and what actions we're in. So his effort obviously was huge the other night (against Miami). If he didn't do what he did defensively down the stretch, that game would have been a lot closer than it was. Just, him guarding their five man at the end of the game and actually getting stops is what makes him so valuable and what makes it to where we feel like he's the best defender in the country because of it."

Clark also gave some insight into what makes Mashack such a great defender. A lot of it was the same points that Crean made when analyzing his play.

He's got the body to defend positions one through five, but it's his basketball IQ and awareness that puts him over the edge.

It's also the extra work and preparation that continue to give him advantages.

"I don't think people realize how smart he is and how much he really understands the game," Clark said. "People just see him going hard and making hustle plays and making stops and just guarding his guy one-on-one. But Jahmai Mashack is one of those guys that puts a lot of time in to understand the game of basketball and watches a lot of basketball.

"It's interesting, I don't know that people know this, when we were at Baha Mar, I was coming out of my hotel room and going to the elevator to go downstairs so we could walk to the convention room to go play. And they have those benches right before you get to the elevator. And this is a few hours before the game, it's right before we go down to leave, and he's laying on that bench, stomach down, watching his phone. I'm like, man, what you doing watching YouTube? He's like I'm just watching Jeremy Roach (of Baylor) highlights. So the dude, he's about to go guard in two hours, he's watching highlights of him on his own. This is completely, no one asked him to do this. But that's how much time and effort he puts into the game and how much pride he takes into being the best defender in the country.

"I don't care at the end of the year how many guys are up for National Defensive Player a year. I know none of them would do that. I know they're not. I don't even know who it is or who it will be, but I don't think they put the time in like that."

Mashack's next test will be against a solid Illinois team that just fell out of the AP Top 25. The Vols are looking to hold on to their No. 1 ranking with the Illini the next team up attempting to steal their throne.

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