Vanderbilt Basketball Intel: Mark Byington and North Carolina, Assistant Vacancy, More

Vanderbilt basketball coach Mark Byington is still in the mix for the North Carolina head coaching job, here's what to make of where that stands right now. PLUS: Where could Vanderbilt turn for its assistant coaching vacancy?

Vanderbilt coach Mark Byington signals to the team during the first half of the SEC tournament championship game against Arkansas at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tenn., Sunday, March 15, 2026. | ANDREW NELLES / THE TENNESSEAN / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

It’s all about the waiting game these days. 

The connection and smoke around Mark Byington and North Carolina won’t go away until that role is filled. Chicago Bulls coach Billy Donovan is expected to have a chance to turn the job down before Byington is heavily considered for it, but won’t decide on it for at least another six days. 

The threat of Byington leaving Vanderbilt for the Carolina job isn’t gone until the role fills, but the intel at this stage appears to indicate that the odds of him being Vanderbilt’s head coach next season are relatively high. That could’ve been a given considering that he signed a contract extension, but it wasn’t perceived as one outside of Nashville.  

Byington’s buyout was the subject of some skepticism nationally and was perceived as not changing markedly enough to fend off North Carolina. The idea isn’t entirely incorrect considering Carolina’s resource pool, but the indication is that the buyout raise isn’t entirely meaningless either. Byington’s extension is said to be in the ballpark of what it was an offseason ago, before it dropped after this season. It’s not unrealistic that Carolina would go after Byington if Donovan turns it down, but it would have to pay a buyout north of eight figures and would have to match the NIL pool that Vanderbilt is arming Byington with–which is expected to be over 10 million. 

That buyout was good enough to fend off Indiana and Virginia a year ago. North Carolina may be willing to pay the price regardless of what it is if Byington is its guy, but there’s been little public indication that he’s being considered in the same tier as Donovan. 

Even if he is, Byington isn’t operating as someone that has intentions of going somewhere else. He’s done multiple media hits–one with a local outlet. When Vanderbilt assistant Kenneth Mangrum departed a few days ago, Byington immediately replaced him with an external hire.  He’s signed a contract extension and called Vanderbilt home in the release that announced it. That matters in that it was a show of commitment to Vanderbilt from Byington. 

North Carolina is always intriguing, but Byington isn’t acting as if he’s leaving. 

The assistant vacancy 

Vanderbilt assistant Jon Cremins had long been tied to the Georgia State head coaching job and was named its head coach on Friday.

Byington and company have known for weeks that Cremins was in the mix for that job as well as the Arkansas Little Rock job. As a result, they’ve been prepared to fill the vacancy. 

A logical candidate that’s picking up some steam is VMI head coach Andrew Wilson—who worked with Byington for a number of years at James Madison and Georgia Southern. 

Midmajor coaches in under-resourced jobs bolting for assistant jobs at top of the league power-five programs has become a trend in this coaching carousel. Wilson would fit that mold. He’s got perhaps the most difficult Division-I job in America and is expected to lose the core of his team to the transfer portal. Wilson was considered for an assistant position when Byington was first hired, but turned it down in hopes of building a winner at VMI.

Wilson has a real competitive nature about him and could keep wanting to keep building at VMI, but him taking the Vanderbilt job this time around could make more sense. 

Jaylon Dean Vines enters the portal 

Vanderbilt will have to find a new star athlete to lead it in dunk lines pregame. The show Dean Vines put on will be missed.

The Vanderbilt freshman guard is entering the transfer portal after a freshman season in which he played sparingly. Dean Vines’ move isn’t all that surprising considering his lack of playing time and the reality that Vanderbilt likely would’ve recruited over him. 

Dean Vines appears to believe he’s ready for whatever opportunity comes next. 

“I just got to play my role for right now,” Dean Vines told Vandy on SI at the SEC Tournament, “So I'm just waiting on my time. I know my time's coming soon. That's what the coaches are telling me, so I'm just staying down.”

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