Vanderbilt's roster is made up almost entirely of transfer portal players

Mark Pope was left a bare cupboard when he accepted the Kentucky men’s basketball coaching gig. The only holdover from John Calipari‘s departure was freshman guard Travis Perry. Pope took the job without a single player on the roster who had played a minute of college basketball.

Mark Byington is in a similar situation at Vanderbilt.

Byington’s roster wasn’t as empty as Pope’s, but it’s objectively harder to build a competent roster at a place like Vanderbilt than a Blue Blood. Byington did an excellent job with what he had though. Only six of the Commodores’ 15 players who have played this season were on the team in 2023-24. They would be Tyler Tanner (Fr.), JQ Robertson (So.), Jordan Williams (So.), Miles Keeffe (Jr.), Graham Calton (Sr.), and Coleson Messer (R Fr.).

But those six have combined to average just 10.8 points in 34.5 minutes per game this season. Tanner (6.4 PPG) is the only one who consistently plays while the rest ride the bench. The vast majority of Vandy’s production comes from pieces Byington brought in from the portal. Like Pope, he didn’t recruit many players from his previous spot at James Madison either. Only Jaylen Carey (7.4 PPG, 5.6 RPG) and Hollman Smith (only six appearances) followed Byington to Nashville.

That leaves seven players with no previous connection to Vanderbilt or Byington. Those seven have helped lead the ‘Dores to a surprising 15-4 start with a 3-3 mark in the SEC, which includes a huge 76-75 home win over No. 6 Tennessee on Jan. 18. They contribute 81.8 percent of Vanderbilt’s total scoring and 77.8 percent of its overall minutes. Everything runs through the portal pieces.

Player	Former school	2024-25 stats
G Jason Edwards (So.)	North Texas (1 year)	17.3 PPG, 2.3 RPG, 1.4 APG
G AJ Hoggard (5th)	Michigan State (4 years)	11.1 PPG, 4.4 APG, 2.7 RPG, 1.4 SPG
F Devin McGlockton (Jr.)	Boston College (2 year)	10.7 PPG, 8.2 RPG, 1.4 BPG
F Tyler Nickel (Jr.)	North Carolina (1 year), Virginia Tech (1 year)	10.6 PPG, 2.3 RPG, 1.1 APG
G MJ Collins (Jr.)	Virginia Tech (2 years)	8.0 PPG, 2.1 RPG
G Chris Manon (Sr.)	Cornell (3 years)	4.9 PPG, 3.2 RPG, 1.3 APG, 1.6 SPG
G Grant Huffman (5th)	Davidson (4 years)	4.7 PPG, 2.3 RPG, 1.4 APG

“We try to find character. We try to find competitive guys. They had to make winning number one,” Byington said after the Tennessee win. “Now, in the NIL days and things like that where, you know, some guys want stats, feel like stats are more money? That wasn’t going to fit with our mission and our team. So the buy-in on that and us trying to figure out who fits that?”

Byington has certainly found the pieces that fit. He also brought in two more talented transfers who have yet to play this season due to injury: Clemson G Alex Hemenway (Gr.) and Southern California F Kijani Wright (Jr.). Byington has found success rebuilding his last two schools (131-97 at Georgia Southern, 82-36 at James Madison) and he’s carrying that over to Vanderbilt at a faster-than-expected rate.

“It’s not easy with that many (transfers) but the guys have completely bought in to what we’re trying to do.”

Kentucky will get a taste of Byington’s eye for talent on Saturday when Vanderbilt hosts the Commodores at 2:30 p.m. EST on ESPN.