Nov. 15, 2009
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Vanderbilt Gamenotes
Vanderbilt basketball begins its 110th season on Monday night when the Lipscomb Bisons make the short trip to Memorial Gym for a 7 p.m. tip off. There will be no network television for the game, but there will be a free webcast of the game on vucommodores.com. The action can also be heard live on the Vanderbilt-ISP Radio Network and vucommodores.com, with Joe Fisher and Tim Thompson on the call.
Vanderbilt played its only exhibition game on November 10 against Alabama-Huntsville, a game it won, 91-56 at Memorial Gym. Sophomore Jeffery Taylor led four Commodore players in double figures with 19 points, with senior point guard Jermaine Beal adding 14 points, sophomore guard Brad Tinsley chipped in 12 points, and sophomore forward Steve Tchiengang scored 11 points off the bench. Redshirt sophomore forward Andre Walker led the team with nine rebounds, and redshirt sophomore center Festus Ezeli scored eight points and had a game-best four blocks.
The Commodores and Bisons will meet for the 26th time on Monday night, and VU leads the all-time series at Vanderbilt, 13-1. The last meeting came on December 7, 2008, at Memorial Gym, in a game Vanderbilt won, 90-67. A.J. Ogilvy posted his first career double-double that night with 26 points and 10 rebounds, while Shan Foster also scored 21 points in the Commodore victory.
The Commodores return 14 letterwinners from a year ago, including all five starters for a team that finished with a 19-12 overall record and an 8-8 record in SEC play in 2008-09. Vanderbilt missed the postseason for the first time for the first time since the 2002-03 season and only the second time in the Kevin Stallings era, which began prior to the 1999-00 season. However, the Commodores were the eighth-least experienced team in the nation in 2008-09 according to KenPom.com, and the team won eight out of its last 11 regular season games, including a win over SEC regular champion LSU in Baton Rouge on March 4.
Senior point guard Jermaine Beal is back after leading the SEC for the second consecutive season in assist-to-turnover ratio, while also increasing his scoring average to 12.5 points per game as a junior, a 4.9 point-per-game increase from his sophomore season. Beal, from DeSoto, Texas, is one of the program’s hardest workers and will lead the Commodores as the only senior on the squad.
The other four starters returning for Vanderbilt include junior center A.J. Ogilvy (15.4 points, 7.1 rebounds per game), sophomore forward Jeffery Taylor (12.5 points, 6.2 rebounds), sophomore guard Brad Tinsley (11.0 points, 2.5 rebounds), and a combination of Steve Tchiengang (3.6 points, 3.1 rebounds) and Darshawn McClellan (2.1 points, 3.0 rebounds) at the power forward position.
Other returning letterwinners include redshirt sophomore wing Charles Hinkle, redshirt sophomore center Festus Ezeli, sophomore forward Lance Goulbourne, redshirt sophomore forward Andre Walker, junior forward Joe Duffy, and walkons Chris Meriwether and Aaron Noll.
6’6 guard Jordan Smart returns after redshirting a year ago, and the only newcomer to the fold, freshman guard John Jenkins, also joins the team.
Walk-on junior guard Elliott Cole will miss the entire season due to a shoulder injury.
Lipscomb played in one exhibition game on November 5 against Freed-Hardeman, and won that game 88-59 behind a double-double from Josh Slater (16 points, 10 rebounds). In their regular season opener, the Bisons dropped a 91-86 decision to Elon on Saturday, despite a pair of 26-point performances by Brandon Brown and Adnan Hodzic.
Lipscomb was picked to win the Atlantic Sun Tournament by league coaches in their preseason poll.
Vanderbilt head coach Kevin Stallings is 2-0 against Lipscomb in his career, with wins coming on December 7, 2006 (59-50) and December 8, 2007 (90-67).