Can Commodores New Men's Basketball Coach Turn Program Around? History Says Yes
The Vanderbilt Commodores Men’s Basketball team will begin a new era next week.
After a terrible season last year, the university decided to make a change with the program and move on from coach Jerry Stackhouse after five seasons.
The Commodores will be under the direction of a new head coach, Mark Byington. The Salem, Virginia native has a resume of turning programs around.
In his first stop as a head coach, he took over duties at Georgia Southern after the program had just finished its seventh losing season. Once he took the job, he transformed the team straight away, and over the next seven seasons, he accomplished a winning record, including four 20-win seasons for the Eagles.
Before joining Vanderbilt, he was recently the head coach of the James Madison Dukes, where he began his tenure in the same type of situation. After four straight losing seasons, Byington turned the program around for a combined 82-36 record over the four years with him at the helm. He capped off his final year with JMU with a 32-4 record in 2023 that included an opening-round win in the NCAA tournament against the Wisconsin Badgers.
Despite Byington's track record, the SEC preseason media poll projected Vanderbilt to finish 16th or last in the conference. The voters must have forgotten about his record over the past 11 seasons.
“This is my twelfth year being a head coach and I’ve been picked every place possible. First, last, and the good thing is, I know some people in here had some votes is it’s not normally right, and there will be a lot of things decided before then,” said Coach Byington a few weeks ago at SEC Media Days. “If we have to take on an underdog role and prove people wrong role, then that's fine.”
In the new landscape of college sports, however, a new coaching change also brings a large amount of roster turnover. Nine players who were on the 2023-24 Commodores team entered the portal this spring. The exchange that is the transfer portal is also beneficial, as Byington and his staff were able to bring in ten different players leaving other programs.
An identity will have to be established, for sure, with a brand new coach, a brand new team, and a program that finished 9-23 just a season ago. However, if history decides to repeat itself for a third time, the Commodores under Coach Byington will be in for an extreme makeover. The veteran coach is a proven winner in the mid-majors and has what it takes to turn Vanderbilt into a conference contender.
The team will begin its first season in the Mark Byington era this Monday, November 4th, against Maryland Eastern Shore at Memorial Stadium in Nashville. The team will look to start the season off strong and build back into a winning program. The Commodores have failed to make the NCAA Tournament since the 2016-17 season.
