Tremendous effort by the team despite the 90-85 OT loss at Bud Walton; George McIntyre passes away, Coach Mason, Geoff McDonald, Corbs, Brandt

Damian was awesome last night  

True heart and soul player Carter Josephs was exceptional as well

 

The VU family lost a good man in former football coach George McIntyre

Mike Anderson was 73-9 at Bud Walton Arena in his six years as head basketball coach of the Arkansas Razorbacks heading into last night's game against us. After Damian's thunderous throw down as time expired in regulation, I thought Anderson was fixing to be 73-10.

While our guys lost the game, 90-85, in overtime, I thought the effort was superb. Damian played like a first round NBA pick with a 24 point, 15 rebound effort. He was awesome. All the guys played really well. Just came up a little short at the end. Coach Stallings and the coaches coached their tails off in this one. They did an outstanding job of putting the guys in the best position to win. Twenty six turnovers did us in last night. That happens against the Razorbacks at Bud Walton. It's a high turnover gym for many visiting teams. They are aggressive on defense and very good at stealing the ball. Wade, Riley, MFD, Luke, who amazingly came back into the lineup with an accelerated recovery from his leg injury, and Jeff played really well. Again, too many turnovers, but we shot 50% from the field, 26-of-52, 50% from trifecta, 10-of-20, and 72% from the line, 23-of-32. I thought our defense got really good in the last 10 minutes of the second half. We out rebounded them 41-36. Luke played with all kinds of heart and played very well, scoring 11 points on two-of-three from trifecta, which was great to see Luke shooting the triple well again, and he pulled down eight boards. Matt Fisher-Davis finished with 20 and was 4-of-8 from trifecta, and 4-of-4 from the line. Riley was 2-of-5 from three, which was awesome. It was great to see Riley shooting the ball better. We need him to. Riley finished with 10. Wade finished with 13 and four assists and made a hugely clutch and difficult lay-up very late in regulation to put us up by a point with 13 seconds left. Arkansas came back down and converted a three. Anderson called timeout with 2.2 seconds left to set his defense, and then Luke and Damian made the plays of the game.

Coach Stallings called for Luke to find the open man on the opposite end of the floor and let them create for a basket whether it would be a three or a two. Luke heaved the ball like Tom Brady down the length of the court intended for Damian. Damian made a Julio Jones-like catch in the left corner of the court, dribbled with a sprint to the goal and thundered the ball down right before the buzzer went off, maybe with a tenth of a second left. The bench went wild. It was awesome.

While we couldn't get over the hump in overtime, I was so proud of the effort and heart of our basketball team last night. It's a loss, I know, but we can build on it and get this thing turned in the right direction. Last year, with a team of true freshmen and sophomores, we won nine in a row in February. We need to do this in January. It starts this Saturday @ South Carolina at 2 PM CT/3 PM ET on ESPNU.

One last note: senior Carter Josephs played an awesome game last night. Carter, who is a 4.0 student in the classroom, just keeps working hard in practice, supports his team during the game, and got a chance to play significant minutes as Wade got in foul trouble. And he really sparked our team in the second half. With Wade in foul trouble, Coach Stallings called on Carter and he responded big time. Carter had four assists and a couple of beautiful back door dimes to Luke and MFD for slams. He was awesome. Carter can be an important player for us going forward. We still need guys like junior Nolan Cressler, freshman Camron Justice, who is trying to get back into the flow of the game after a concussion sidelined him for a while, and frosh Joe Toye, who shows a ton of promise and is figuring out the college game, to help us right now.  Josh Henderson can still help us, too. Josh is an awesome guy, has paid his dues as a sixth year senior, and can help Luke, Damian and Jeff down low. Josh is a good offensive player and good at setting picks and banging with the big guys in the SEC. All of these guys can really help us along with the starters, Roberson, Fisher-Davis, LaChance, Baldwin 4, Damian and of course, Luke, who didn't start last night but will probably start Saturday.

So there's a lot to be positive about with our team. We've got a great group that wants to do well. We will start getting W's and string several in a row very soon. Truly believe that.

On a regrettable  note, former Vanderbilt football coach George McIntyre passed away yesterday at 76. Coach McIntyre was our coach from 1979-84 and had some good teams. His 1982 team, led by stud quarterback Whit Taylor, finished 8-3, beat Tennessee, and went to the then Hall of Fame Bowl in Birmingham, where we fell to Air Force. But we had good teams in those years. I was a student from 1980-84, and saw us knock off Florida at home in 1983 and have some other good victories under Coach Mac. He defeated Alabama at Tuscaloosa in 1984, 30-21. Very good football coach. He was a first class man as well. He was a true man of character and integrity; a great Vanderbilt man. His son, Mike, who is first class as well, is the head coach at Colorado and is doing a solid job in Boulder. Mike's a good football coach. Coach McIntyre will be missed by the Vanderbilt family. Really fine man.

Will have any recruiting news that pops up. Coach Mason and the coaches are out doing work and putting together an excellent class with some more quality players getting close to committing. Will talk to Geoff McDonald, our defending national championship women's tennis coach, to preview the season. I'll talk to Geoff next week and have a piece on our tennis team, which looks to go back to back, Thursday of next week. Will also get a conversation in with Corbs in the next two weeks if he's good with that.

Brandt in action starting tomorrow at the Hyundai Tournament of Champions in Maui. The first PGA tournament of 2016 features all the winners on tour last year. Brandt won the AT&T Classic at Pebble Beach with an awesome four rounds of golf and he and Jason Dufner won the Franklin Templeton Shootout last month in Naples, FL., so that's good stuff for B entering this star studded tournament. Will keep you posted on Brandt's progress. THE PGA season is underway and Brandt, Jon Curran and Luke List will be competing for titles.

Basketball will get it going. Saturday would be a huge boost if we could go to Columbia and defeat an undefeated and 22nd ranked South Carolina team, that is 14-0. We'll have our work cut out for us. We can surely get this done though. Believe in the guys and the coaches.