With perhaps as many as 14 of the league’s 16 teams potentially headed to the 68-team NCAA Tournament that begins March 19, it’s easy to understand why so much attention is focused on this year’s SEC tourney. Some analysts have suggested winning the NCAA crown will be easier to win than the SEC championship, and it’s hard to argue.
For example, the resurgent Vanderbilt team, ranked dead-last in the preseason poll, notched its 20th win of the season March 1 with a 97-93 overtime victory against No. 14 Missouri at Memorial Gym. That put Vandy at 20-9 overall and 8-8 in the SEC with two regular-season games left before the SEC tournament.
It marked the Commodores’ sixth consecutive game against an AP Top 25 team since Feb. 1, a stretch in which they compiled a 3-3 record. They lost the first three against No. 1 Auburn, No. 5 Tennessee and No. 17 Kentucky before defeating No. 24 Ole Miss, No. 12 Texas A&M and then Mizzou.
Also, it’s the first time since the 1987-88 season that Vandy has beaten four Top 15 foes in a season. That’s elevated the Commodores from the bracketologists’ list of “bubble teams” to being as high as a No. 8 NCAA seed.
“I’ve talked to the guys about our mentality,” says first-year Vandy coach Mark Byington, who is getting growing support for SEC coach of the year honors after reviving a program that went 9-23 a year ago.
“We’re not satisfied with our stability of being in the NCAA Tournament. We need to keep getting better and position ourselves in the SEC Tournament as high as we can possibly get to. Try to make a run in that tournament and then when the selection committee decides where we want to go, we’ll try to make a run in that tournament."
Byington, who went 32-4 a year ago at James Madison, is one of those who tout the strength and superiority of SEC basketball this season. Both he and his players say the Commodores are playing with a chip on their shoulder.
“We’ve got something to prove, and that’s a great motivator,” Byington says. “We talked about the NCAA tournament. We talked about this league. And some people want to run from the challenge of this league. They want to run from the competition. Like I said, six straight ranked teams. Nobody else is going through that besides the SEC.
“So what that does is it kind of figures out how strong you are, how good you are. And you better learn along the way. And these guys are doing it. We make mistakes, we learn from them and, you know, we’ve got more to prove. Now, we’ve got 20 wins. But this is not something where we ran across the finish line. Like, it’s still in front of us.”
A.J. Hoggard, who transferred to Vandy from Michigan State, is one of the few players on the team to have played in the NCAA Tournament. He says that and the fact that Vandy was picked last in the poll motivates the Commodores.
“We have a lot of guys that have a chip, you know? Like, I go back to before … I’m the only one and Coach (Byington) and JMU transfer Jaylen (Carey) and the staff who’s been playing in March. So a lot of guys that actually are wanting to get there and wanting to make it consistently,” Hoggard says. “We’re still going one game at a time. Really not looking too far ahead right now. We’ve still got work to handle in front of us.”
Before the last week of the season, the top four SEC tournament seeds looked like Auburn, Alabama, Tennessee and Florida (not necessarily in that order).
Like Byington, third-year Missouri coach Dennis Gates is one of those touting the strength of the SEC.
“This is the best conference ever assembled at this moment,” Gates says after the loss at Vanderbilt. “When you look at the depth of our conference, you look at the coaches, the coaching staffs, our nonconference record, I just hope we get 14 teams into the NCAA’s. “There is nothing this competitive out there. There’s absolutely nothing. And in my eyes, there are 16 teams. Every game is a Sweet 16-type of game and I really mean that.”
Local SEC star power
The league is full of talented players who could someday be playing at the professional level. And a handful hail from the ranks of Nashville-area high schools.
Two of them – Tennessee guard Chaz Lanier and Ole Miss forward Malik Dia – briefly played together at Ensworth under then-coach Ricky Bowers before taking different journeys. The NIL era and transfer portal helped them reach the SEC.
Lanier spent four seasons at North Florida before joining the Vols this year. He’s started every game and through March 1 and leads the Vols with 17.8 points per game.
Dia spent his freshman year at Vanderbilt, then spent a season at Belmont before joining Ole Miss, where he’s also started every game and is averaging 10.3 points.
The Ledger asked them about their relationship and circuitous journey to this year’s SEC tournament in their hometown, where they could very well meet again.
“Oh, yeah, man, it’s been a blessing to see my work come around in full fruition. One word to sum it up is just a blessing,” Lanier says. “I never thought I’d be in this position because I remember watching that at home in Nashville. Just watching the (SEC) tournament with my mom and seeing all the traffic and seeing how big it is. So now, being able to participate in it with the Tennessee Vols is special.
“The season has been special already and I’m just looking forward to the rest of the season. I’m excited.”
Dia says he only played with Lanier for five games at Ensworth, explaining that he was a freshman transfer from Murfreesboro Blackman and was ineligible to play for most of that season. But he says they formed a bond that continues to this day.
“Yeah, Chaz is my dog. I talk to Chaz a good little bit. We really built a connection in those last five games of the season that I was eligible and I played with him,” Dia says. “So, off the court we just have a really good relationship. I talk to him, whether it’s about ball or – Chaz is the kind of guy who really loves basketball – or whatever it is, he’s just such an amazing dude. Regardless of that age gap of two years, I think we’ve always been really good friends.
“Potentially playing him is going to be super exciting. I think that’s also going to be exciting for the community of Ensworth, just seeing two Ensworth kids playing on one of the biggest stages of SEC basketball in the tournament.”
Another local player to watch is Vandy freshman Tyler Tanner, a Brentwood Academy product. He’s played in every game, averaging 20.5 minutes, 5.6 points per game through March 1 and dishing out 57 assists.
“I wanted to play in the SEC, the best talent in the country in my opinion. The best competition in the country so I can get better every night,” Tanner says. “It’s been everything I thought it was going to be – probably more, talking about the level of competition that we face every night.”
Tanner says he attended last year’s SEC tournament “and just envisioning myself in all those players’ shoes at that time. I’m just thankful to be in this position now.”
He hopes Vandy fans turn out in droves and bring some Memorial Magic with them.
“I think we’re going to need that. It’s going to be hard but with our fan base and the energy that our team has now, I think we’ll be good.
“(The SEC tournament) is going to be amazing. Every game is going to be competitive, no matter what the seedings are … just because everybody’s so good. Whoever plays better on any given night is going to win. It’s going to be a lot of competitive games, probably some shockers. But I think we’re confident in our abilities in the tournament and will come out on top.”
Dia says SEC expansion with the additions of Oklahoma and Texas have taken the league – and the city – to another level.
“Nashville’s going to be popping – as it always is during the SEC tournament,” Dia says. “The city comes out, a lot of people are around and it’s super amazing. With the addition of Texas and Oklahoma, it just makes the league even more tough than what it already was and what we’ve already seen all year.
“The SEC is basically the best league in the history of college basketball, they say. Each and every game is a challenge and I think this SEC tournament is going to be bigtime basketball and it’s going to be super exciting.”
One should expect nothing less from the nation’s best basketball conference.