A couple of weeks ago was Mark Byington’s 48th birthday. For the occasion, he enjoyed a shrimp po’boy sandwich, eaten alone.
“It sounds sad,” he says, “but I mean, it was another day.”
Byington just laughs at the thought. It’s the afternoon after his neglected birthday, but he’s well into “another” day, a description that shouldn’t be construed as a routine workday. It’s evident by the bags under his eyes — and the walls that are still bare in his office — that he hasn’t worked a routine day in weeks.
When he agreed in late March to leave James Madison and become Vanderbilt’s men’s basketball coach, he took over a program largely without a team. Most of the Commodores from Jerry Stackhouse’s final roster were planning to move on, either through graduation or the transfer portal.
“I haven't worked less than a 20-hour day since I've gotten here,” Byington says. “That's what is needed right now, and my staff is doing that as well . . . It could be the most important couple of weeks of our entire year is going on right now.”
I barely know Byington, and already, I'm empathizing with him and his confined new world. No oxygen for things like birthday candles or sightseeing or house-hunting. At first, he lived in a hotel near campus. Then he used a friend’s condo in The Gulch, unsure where he’d be headed after that.
The real move comes later. Byington’s son Chase — a rising junior basketball player — will arrive from Virginia in the summer and attend Brentwood Academy in the fall. They got that sorted out at least.
Otherwise, Byington’s Vanderbilt tenure has been a bleary-eyed blur. He has a new team. He has received commitments from seven transfers, including two — guards Jason Edwards and Chris Manon — rated as four-star additions by 247Sports. Signee Tyler Tanner stayed on board with Vandy, too, and in fact hosted Byington’s son on that visit to Brentwood Academy.
Criticize that bad, ol’ transfer portal, if you like, for what it’s doing to college basketball. But if you’re criticizing it as a Vanderbilt fan, you need to also acknowledge the words of your new coach: “If it wasn't for the transfer portal, we wouldn't have a chance to be successful next year.”
So he's telling y'all there's a chance.
Why Vanderbilt basketball for Mark Byington?
Byington’s mother is a retired elementary school principal. His brother is a professor at a community college in North Carolina. Byington, too, originally planned to be a professor before veering into coaching when he realized, as a former college player, that he missed being around the game.
The fact that he studied psychology — specializing in sports psychology — has made a nice addition to a coaching toolbox, leaving him to realize how "the players right now go through more than any generation of players ever has. The attention, the criticism, the social media presence, they deal with so much more.
"It's not always, 'Hey, let's just go out and play hard,' " he adds.
Answers like these help explain how Byington climbed the coaching ladder in 11 years as a head coach at Georgia Southern and James Madison, but they don't explain why he wanted his next step to be at Vanderbilt.
Because he could be easily losing sleep someplace else.
Each season, there’s a mid-major team or two that leaps early on to the national radar, and this time, it was JMU. Byington’s Dukes won 32 games and were ranked as high as No. 18 in the Associated Press poll, meaning his name was on the coaching radar well before the NCAA tournament. For Byington, who says he had turned down interest previously while at JMU, it was time to listen.
“This year, there was a lot of attention,” he says, “ . . . with a number of different schools. We got in the process with a lot of them.”
While getting “deep down the line with some other” schools, Byington says he had eyes on the Vanderbilt job. Something about it. Maybe it had to do with his own educational background, but it was also the SEC.
Except at that time, Vanderbilt hadn’t reached out to him. When Byington told his agent of his top choice, “I think it was that night where there was a connection there. Vanderbilt reached out to him, and we started working along that way.”
By the time James Madison lost to Duke in the NCAA tournament’s second round after upsetting Wisconsin, he knew what was next. It only had to be made official. He was named Vandy’s coach the next day.
“Obviously, it’s in the SEC,” Byington says. “But I think it fits a pattern of places of jobs I’ve been successful at before. I do like rebuilding, and I do like finding places that maybe aren’t up to their potential right now and maybe some things have changed, whether it’s commitment and all that . . .
“It was an attractive job. And I’m one of those, too, where you want to be going against the best of the best.”
'We're building it, and we're building it fast'
If Byington didn’t immediately understand the dimensions of his new job, he’s learning quickly.
He’s telling a story about a prospective player who got away. Byington believed he would have been perfect for his system. Couldn’t even get him, though.
“Basically, they were arguing over about $50,000 (in NIL funds),” he says, “and I said, 'Well, if the kid comes to Vanderbilt, this degree is going to be worth millions of dollars over his lifetime. And also, he's going to play more for me. He's going to be in a better style for him. Is it all about the most money now?' "
Through the efforts of athletic director Candice Storey Lee, Vanderbilt of late has prioritized the NIL space in an attempt to help sports like football and basketball better compete in the SEC.
On his way out the door, Stackhouse noted the lack of NIL support, saying, “You have to be a player in that, and we quite frankly haven't been a big player in that yet.” His warning couldn’t be overlooked for a Vanderbilt program that’s seven seasons and counting without an NCAA tournament bid.
Previously:Before exiting, Jerry Stackhouse offered a warning for Vanderbilt basketball | Estes
“Even during the interview process,” Byington says, “my wheels were turning and trying to figure out, ‘All right, can I have a plan there to be successful?’ . . . I had belief that I could come in with a vision to be able to change things, and when I met Candice Storey Lee, her vision matched mine, and her plan for the program matched what I wanted to do.”
He spent two days going over footage of this past Vanderbilt season. He treated it like he was scouting the Commodores to play them — examining strengths and weaknesses in the hopes of figuring out who would be a good fit.
Given the time crunch, he admits, it was far from ideal in terms of building relationships.
“It’s got to work both ways,” Byington says, “and sometimes it’s me believing in them but them not wanting to be here. Or sometimes, it’s the other way. Sometimes, I have to be honest with them and say, ‘Look, you’re not going to play here, and you don’t fit my style or maybe this league is above you’ or whatever else might be the case. I’ve got to be honest with them.”
As he speaks, a cell phone cries for attention.
He's got a million things going on at once. Admirably, he’s trying his best to play host. He’s showing off the few decorations in his office. A photo here, a basketball there. He's telling a few stories. I appreciate the hospitality.
I don't have the heart to prolong my visit. Lest I be the reason a 20-hour day is 21.
"We're building it,” Byington tells me, “and we're building it fast."
Reach Tennessean sports columnist Gentry Estes at gestes@tennessean.com and on the X platform (formerly known as Twitter) @Gentry_Estes.
