Takeaways From Vanderbilt Basketball's 83-71 Win Over South Carolina

Vanderbilt basketball opened SEC play a winner on Saturday afternoon in Columbia.

The Commodores led the Gamecocks by double digits for the majority of its trip to Columbia, were up by as much as 18 and ultimatley sealed the day with an 83-71 win.

Here's a few takeaways from the day.

Duke Miles update

Vanderbilt guard Duke Miles missed Saturday’s game with a leg injury, Vandy on SI learned. Jeff Goodman of the Field of 68 termed it a “knee” injury.

Miles missed Monday’s game against New Haven with an illness, but appeared in a Vanderbilt social media post throughout the week in a knee brace. Miles traveled with the team and was listed as a game-time decision prior to Saturday’s game. Mark Byington told reporters that there was optimism Miles would play on Saturday, but did not disclose the injury. ‘

When Miles emerged after gate-opening time, he was in street clothes. His status moving forward is up in the air.

Miles is Vanderbilt’s leading scorer and averages 17.1 points, 4.7 assists, 2.8 rebounds and 2.8 steals per game. The veteran guard is shooting 48.8% from the field and 35.7% from 3-point range.

Vanderbilt will need the veteran guard back soon if it’s going to make a run in SEC play. It appears as if it won’t be missing him for all that long.

The necessary outcome

South Carolina will likely finish near the bottom of the SEC and doesn’t have much of a chance to play its way into the NCAA Tournament. Regardless of where the game was played on Saturday, Vanderbilt couldn’t lose it.

A loss would hurt Vanderbilt’s metrics too severely, would be too demoralizing and would call too many things into question about it. Even with injuries being a factor, Vanderbilt needed to find a way to win in order to support the case that it’s the SEC’s best team.

That happened for Vanderbilt on Saturday. That appears to be the biggest takeaway from the day.

Here’s an example of the circumstances in which Vanderbilt had to win on Saturday

Byington looked to give his starters a breather in the first half and had to dip below his normal rotation in order to do so.

Vanderbilt put out a lineup of AK Okereke, Miles Keeffe, Chandler Bing, Tyler Nickel and Jalen Washington as it looked to hold onto its lead on Saturday. Without Miles or Vanderbilt point guard Frankie Collins–who is week-to-week with a meniscus injury–Vanderbilt had to find minutes anywhere it could get them.

Without two of its three primary ballhandlers, Vanderbilt had to stretch itself thin. It had enough to find a way to win on Saturday, though.

How about AK Okereke?

Okereke may have played his best game in a Vanderbilt uniform on Saturday.

The Vanderbilt forward finished Saturday afternoon’s win with 17 points and six rebounds while shooting 7-for-13 from the field as well as 3-for-6 from 3-point range. Okereke also picked up some ball handling responsibilities. Without Miles and Collins, Vanderbilt needed someone to step up and play above their weight a bit.

Okereke answered the call by taking on some of the scoring and initiating responsibilities that he often did at Cornell a season ago. That was vintage Okereke, who changed the outlook of Saturday’s game.

Perhaps that could be a building block for Okereke moving forward.

An absurd stat

Tyler Tanner had seven assists and no turnovers at halftime of Saturday’s game. That’s how you win a league game on the road without two of your three primary ballhandlers.

Tanner finished Saturday with 14 assists, one turnover and 19 points. It was a classic Tanner performance.

The best stat of the day? Tanner tied the program record with 14 assists. He could’ve set the record had Devin McGlockton knocked down a late 3, also.