Tennessee Fans Raised More Than $300,000 in 24 Hours for a Player Whose Family's Home Burned Down

Zakai Zeigler has been one of the best stories in college basketball this season. The 5'9" freshman guard, who didn't have a single power conference offer until last summer when he dominated the Nike Peach Jam AAU tournament, came to Tennessee from Long Island, N.Y. without much buzz and with the No. 1 point guard in his class, Kennedy Chandler, ahead of him on the depth chart. All he's done since is play 21 minutes per game, averaging 8.7 points, 2.4 assists and nearly two steals per contest while shooting 36 percent from three. He's been must-watch in the second half of the season on one of the best teams in the country.

Unfortunately, it came out during UT's game against Georgia on Tuesday night that Zeigler's family lost their home in New York to a fire. Immediately, Tennessee fans wanted to mobilize Vol Twitter to help. Zeigler and UT put out a link to a GoFundMe at 3 p.m. on Wednesday and within an hour, the $50,000 goal had already been met. As of Thursday morning, the page had raised more than $340,000.

Every once in a while, there's a story that reminds you sports are cool sometimes. Obviously what happened to Zeigler is horrific, but to see UT fans — and plenty of others from around the SEC and the country — rally around him to this level is really awesome.

Hopefully this gets the Zeigler family back on their feet sooner than later. Great work, everybody.