Vanderbilt called its shot before the round-one battle vs. Kentucky. In fact, the Commodores did it in October at SEC Media Days by saying their roster was better than the team Mark Pope assembled in 2025-26 — even with the $22M price tag.
“We’ll be able to compete with everybody in the SEC,” forward Devin McGlockton told KSR at the time.
After the 80-55 win in Nashville, McGlockton revealed that physicality was a glaring weakness for the Wildcats and his head coach, Mark Byington, told the team ‘we could exploit that’ and ‘that’s what we did.