Josiah-Jordan James stood alone on the top deck of the boat bouncing northeast across Lake Como.

Music thumped below James on the lower level of the two-tiered vessel as the tour boat carrying the Tennessee basketball team trudged toward the city of Bellagio. The water was choppy and the trip was taking longer than planned, but James didn't mind.

He's in no rush. He was merely enjoying the ride.

“I haven't been this content with life in my entire life,” James said.

That's the veteran, settled wisdom from an athlete satisfied in a position he never expected to be in.

James shouldn't have been in Italy. He shouldn't be at Tennessee. The labels he held arriving at Tennessee and during his basketball career say that: He was a five-star recruit and a McDonald’s All-American when he came to Knoxville. He’s donning a new label these days: James is a fifth-year senior, a college basketball player for longer than he ever imagined.

He has more than accepted it. He’s loving it and learning to thrive in it. To James, he shouldn't be anywhere else.

The weight of being labeled a five-star recruit, McDonald's All-American

James already had a plan how his college career was going to play out.

He’d be at Tennessee for one season and become the second one-and-done in program history. He’d follow in the footsteps of the first and be a first-round NBA Draft pick like Tobias Harris in 2011.

“I knew what was going to happen,” James said. “I had my whole life figured out.”

Instead nothing went as James planned and he figured out life as it veered differently. He found out he's a work in progress, not a finished product — and that it's OK to be ever-arriving.

He’s a perfectionist accepting the unattainability of perfection. He’s laid back off the court and fiery on it. He has pressed into reading and faith and yoga and therapy, sanding rough edges and seeking to understand and expand his mind.

To get to this place, James had to face the prickly underbelly of being a heralded recruit as coach Rick Barnes’ first five-star at UT. There was a pivotal chat with his parents as a freshman. Barnes and then-associate head coach Mike Schwartz confronted James before a practice that season to try and ease James’ load.

He looked like he was carrying all the pressure the world could offer.

“I could see why it probably looked like that just because I had so many expectations for myself and people had so many expectations for me and the team,” James said.

The weight he carried began with being a five-star prospect. He was the high-profile newcomer to a Tennessee team that was ranked No. 1 for a month the season before but had the roster turn over. He was a high school superstar, a 6-foot-6 guard with on-court intuition. Eight of the players in his 2019 McDonald’s All-American class would be first-round picks a year later, including the top two picks.

James saw people tagging him in NBA Draft projections saying he would go in the first round. Those expectations showed up in James’ game and thinking. He was an 18-year-old trying to turn himself into the 25-year-old version of himself in a few months on a college campus.

Former assistant coach Kim English shared the comment with James that people are one of two things. They’re either humble or about to be humbled.

It didn’t make sense to James. Then it clicked. He had to shed the pride attached to labels to find freedom.

“I had to put away all the accolades and the terms that they were putting besides my name and just be Josiah-Jordan James, the person,” James said.

Finding peace on the path to being a fifth-year senior

James remains the same affable and approachable presence he has been since he got to Tennessee. He’s personable and warm, a big-smiling kid who has turned into an introspective adult in college.

He’s a matured presence with a grasp on who he is, who he is not, and what matters most.

“One thing that I had to realize and that I'm learning to realize — that's been tough for me to realize — is that I can't please everybody,” James said.

James wants to be loved. He’s a people-pleaser at his core. That innermost desire often existed at odds with how his career at Tennessee progressed, the small scar on his left wrist depicting the conflict: You can’t please everyone when you can’t be at your best.

This is, in large part, why James is a fifth-year senior. He’s got something to prove. He’s more and better than what he got to show in his first four years. This year is about no what-ifs and he cast off the ails of previous seasons.

James is a gifted basketball player who is finally in position to flex his full range. The Charleston, South Carolina, native is healthy now, the first time he has confidently and completely declared a spotless bill of health. He has had knee surgery and wrist surgery. He has torn a ligament in his finger, sprained an ankle and battled a hip injury.

James hasn’t questioned who he is and what he is capable of doing. He has questioned if he would get to become it. He battled injuries. He has seen four other five-stars come and go as one-and-dones. He realized it wasn’t his lot in life.

He got more college than he bargained for and the extra years proved life-changing.

James finds peace in yoga, the breathing rhythms on the mat helping him realize he is where he should be. James, whose grandmother was a pastor, applied himself to his faith. He credits Chris Walker and Jessica Brewster with Fellowship of Christian Athletes for walking with him.

“It's ultimately like this life I'm living isn't for me and it's for Jesus Christ,” James said. “Sometimes, it is hard to realize that.”

James is discerning of what is essential to him. He isn’t derailed by missed shots the way he might have been in his first two years. More importantly, he merely wants to please God and his family and his closest friends.

“They've loved me before I was a McDonald's All-American, five-star athlete, this and that,” James said. “They love me for me and basketball's just something that I do. I realized that those are the people that I need to make happy.”

Josiah-Jordan James wouldn't be anywhere else

James reclined in the bow of the boat and tightened his black bucket hat.

The Italian flag flapped behind him as he flipped open a Colleen Hoover book and started to read, the mountains of Northern Italy surrounding him.

This is James as his contented self. He has learned there is as much beauty in the journey as there is in the destination — maybe even more.

“I'm right with the people I need to be with,” James said. “I'm in the situation where I need to be. I don't need to change anything else. I just need to be confident in myself and be me.”

James came back to Tennessee with all the right thoughts. He went through the NBA Draft process, pushing toward the goal that he has always had. He told the UT coaches he likely would not be back. He got feedback that left him thinking if he could get a healthy season showing his entire skill set that he’d be better off.

He also craved more time at Tennessee.

Tennessee didn’t have any scholarships open when James decided he was coming back to use the extra year of eligibility granted by the NCAA due to the COVID-19 pandemic. He was willing to walk on. His love for Tennessee first burst through when he was a recruit always seeing someone in orange watching him play. He has felt the adoration returned throughout his career in the highs and lows. It is deep-seated and drew him back.

James is relishing the result. He’s playing carefree and the best basketball of his life. He’s shooting better than ever before. He’s found a niche and he’s dominating it. He scored his 1,000th career point in Tennessee's win against Wofford on Nov. 14.

He is who he always believed he could be even if the still-in-college part of it all is unbelievable.

“It might not sit well with other people that I came in and I was a supposed to be one-and-done and I'm here for fifth year,” James said. “But it's OK with me and I go to sleep at night perfectly fine.”

The NBA is still there. That is the one thing James says he is still searching for. But he’s unhurried. Those dreams will still be there in a few months, the only months left he has as a college basketball player. He'd like to achieve program firsts at Tennessee in March. He's enjoying life with his teammates.

He's a fifth-year five-star who is content and he’s in control of the labels now.

“It has to be this year because there’s no coming back after this,” James said.

Mike Wilson covers University of Tennessee athletics. Email him at michael.wilson@knoxnews.com and follow him on Twitter @ByMikeWilson. If you enjoy Mike’s coverage, consider a digital subscription that will allow you access to all of it

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Tennessee basketball: Josiah-Jordan James on 5 years at UT, NBA draft