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OKLAHOMA CITY — It almost didn’t matter. All of it.
All those Nebraska fans. All the roars and heckles and boos. Vanderbilt had the gumption to stare it down, hopes teetering after another slow start, yet never dissipating. Not until that final impossible heave by Tyler Tanner impossibly touched every bit of the rim but didn’t drop through, meaning his spectacular night somehow still wasn’t spectacular enough.
Nebraska 74, Vanderbilt 72.
March Madness, am I right?
No event in American sports like it. But gracious, it can be cruel. Sometimes, that’s for someone else to endure. But eventually, it comes for you, too, and then you’re sitting there uttering the truly heartbreaking words that Vanderbilt coach Mark Byington did:
“I just want one play back.”
There were plenty of things in Vanderbilt’s control it could’ve done. I’ll start with an 11-for-19 performance at the free-throw line. That’s 57.9% for a team that led the SEC this season at 79.4%.
Consistently, Nebraska got better looks offensively. That’s why the Cornhuskers shot 55.8%, making 9 of 19 attempts from 3-point range. Vanderbilt shot 37 times from 3-point range and missed 24. Most of the game, you looked at the stats and wondered how the game was still there for the taking. But it was.
The Commodores led 72-70 in the final minute. Then they allowed two buckets and nearly let the shot clock expire on their last full possession, forcing Chandler Bing to hoist a hurried one-timer that missed. That was a tough ask for a freshman with two points who had attempted only one previous shot.
None of that can be blamed on the crowd discrepancy that, again, almost didn’t matter.
But it did matter.
It’s insincere to suggest otherwise.
That’s nothing against Nebraska. What the Cornhuskers’ fans did here was special, and their team earned this on the court. The Commodores made sure of it.
From Vanderbilt’s perspective, though, the toughest part of this will just be the what-if of a NCAA selection process that didn’t appropriately value its season. It won’t be easy to look at how this played out in Oklahoma City and not feel shortchanged — and to wonder why you deserved this ordeal.
The day before the NCAA selection show, Vanderbilt whipped Florida — the reigning national champs and a deserving No. 1 seed in this bracket — by 17 points at Bridgestone Arena. That was after consecutive wins over Tennessee, a No. 6 seed that had made the past two Elite Eights.
Vanderbilt was under-seeded as a No. 5. Metrics were consistent in saying that it should’ve been a No. 4 seed, maybe even before beating Florida. Instead, Alabama got that No. 4 seed despite losing to Vandy in January, losing by 23 to Florida in February and to Ole Miss in its lone SEC Tournament game.
The committee tries to favor top-four seeds in determining sites. So Alabama is getting to play in Tampa, while Vanderbilt was sent here. Along with Nebraska. And its fans.
Tell you what, I have a newfound respect for the passion and devotion of Cornhuskers fans. Television didn’t do justice to how loud it was in the Oklahoma City Thunder’s arena.
Sure, teams have crowd advantages all the time in “neutral site” Men’s NCAA Tournament games. But if you were here to experience this, you’d understand how this wasn’t just a typical road game for Vanderbilt. It was the most difficult road game of the season. With all that was riding on the result, the atmosphere never eased up. It was relentless.
“I know it had to be incredible on TV,” Byington said. “It was an incredible game. I mean, it sucks we were on the side we were on. A high-level game, and I'm sure the crowd lifted them up and had them playing. They played so hard.
“But (you) second-guess where you are put or your seeding and all these other things, it just adds to the list of things that you're kind of sitting here thinking, ‘I just want one play back, and we win the game, in this environment.’ And that would have been even more rewarding. It's hard when you felt like you were that close to winning and didn't.”
Vanderbilt, from Byington to his players, didn’t make the crowd an excuse. But it’s hard to believe it wasn’t worth at least three points. It's one thing if it’s a conference game in January, but this is a tournament that rarely, if ever, asks that of its teams, much less an SEC team that won 27 games and had stellar metrics all season.
This wasn’t a second-round matchup of a No. 1 and a No. 9 seed, where the top seed had earned having the crowd in its corner. These were very similar teams who had very similar seasons, and that didn’t justify the disadvantage one was dealt.
You can credit Nebraska's fans for causing that while also wondering what the heck Vanderbilt did (or didn’t do) to deserve to be in such a position in the first place.
A commonly brutal March Madness ending, in this instance, was uncommon. While great seasons end all the time in moments like these, they don’t usually die with thoughts of the court being stormed once it happens.
Reach Tennessean sports columnist Gentry Estes at [email protected] and hang out with him on Bluesky @gentryestes.bsky.social
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Vanderbilt's season deserved better than the March Madness fate it got
Continue reading...
All those Nebraska fans. All the roars and heckles and boos. Vanderbilt had the gumption to stare it down, hopes teetering after another slow start, yet never dissipating. Not until that final impossible heave by Tyler Tanner impossibly touched every bit of the rim but didn’t drop through, meaning his spectacular night somehow still wasn’t spectacular enough.
Nebraska 74, Vanderbilt 72.
March Madness, am I right?
No event in American sports like it. But gracious, it can be cruel. Sometimes, that’s for someone else to endure. But eventually, it comes for you, too, and then you’re sitting there uttering the truly heartbreaking words that Vanderbilt coach Mark Byington did:
“I just want one play back.”
There were plenty of things in Vanderbilt’s control it could’ve done. I’ll start with an 11-for-19 performance at the free-throw line. That’s 57.9% for a team that led the SEC this season at 79.4%.
Consistently, Nebraska got better looks offensively. That’s why the Cornhuskers shot 55.8%, making 9 of 19 attempts from 3-point range. Vanderbilt shot 37 times from 3-point range and missed 24. Most of the game, you looked at the stats and wondered how the game was still there for the taking. But it was.
The Commodores led 72-70 in the final minute. Then they allowed two buckets and nearly let the shot clock expire on their last full possession, forcing Chandler Bing to hoist a hurried one-timer that missed. That was a tough ask for a freshman with two points who had attempted only one previous shot.
None of that can be blamed on the crowd discrepancy that, again, almost didn’t matter.
But it did matter.
It’s insincere to suggest otherwise.
That’s nothing against Nebraska. What the Cornhuskers’ fans did here was special, and their team earned this on the court. The Commodores made sure of it.
From Vanderbilt’s perspective, though, the toughest part of this will just be the what-if of a NCAA selection process that didn’t appropriately value its season. It won’t be easy to look at how this played out in Oklahoma City and not feel shortchanged — and to wonder why you deserved this ordeal.
The day before the NCAA selection show, Vanderbilt whipped Florida — the reigning national champs and a deserving No. 1 seed in this bracket — by 17 points at Bridgestone Arena. That was after consecutive wins over Tennessee, a No. 6 seed that had made the past two Elite Eights.
Vanderbilt was under-seeded as a No. 5. Metrics were consistent in saying that it should’ve been a No. 4 seed, maybe even before beating Florida. Instead, Alabama got that No. 4 seed despite losing to Vandy in January, losing by 23 to Florida in February and to Ole Miss in its lone SEC Tournament game.
The committee tries to favor top-four seeds in determining sites. So Alabama is getting to play in Tampa, while Vanderbilt was sent here. Along with Nebraska. And its fans.
Tell you what, I have a newfound respect for the passion and devotion of Cornhuskers fans. Television didn’t do justice to how loud it was in the Oklahoma City Thunder’s arena.
Sure, teams have crowd advantages all the time in “neutral site” Men’s NCAA Tournament games. But if you were here to experience this, you’d understand how this wasn’t just a typical road game for Vanderbilt. It was the most difficult road game of the season. With all that was riding on the result, the atmosphere never eased up. It was relentless.
“I know it had to be incredible on TV,” Byington said. “It was an incredible game. I mean, it sucks we were on the side we were on. A high-level game, and I'm sure the crowd lifted them up and had them playing. They played so hard.
“But (you) second-guess where you are put or your seeding and all these other things, it just adds to the list of things that you're kind of sitting here thinking, ‘I just want one play back, and we win the game, in this environment.’ And that would have been even more rewarding. It's hard when you felt like you were that close to winning and didn't.”
Vanderbilt, from Byington to his players, didn’t make the crowd an excuse. But it’s hard to believe it wasn’t worth at least three points. It's one thing if it’s a conference game in January, but this is a tournament that rarely, if ever, asks that of its teams, much less an SEC team that won 27 games and had stellar metrics all season.
This wasn’t a second-round matchup of a No. 1 and a No. 9 seed, where the top seed had earned having the crowd in its corner. These were very similar teams who had very similar seasons, and that didn’t justify the disadvantage one was dealt.
You can credit Nebraska's fans for causing that while also wondering what the heck Vanderbilt did (or didn’t do) to deserve to be in such a position in the first place.
A commonly brutal March Madness ending, in this instance, was uncommon. While great seasons end all the time in moments like these, they don’t usually die with thoughts of the court being stormed once it happens.
Reach Tennessean sports columnist Gentry Estes at [email protected] and hang out with him on Bluesky @gentryestes.bsky.social
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Vanderbilt's season deserved better than the March Madness fate it got
Continue reading...
