Unpretty, but unbeaten

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Good morning! If you missed some of the amazing individual scoring performances from last night, no worries. We’re got it all, from Paul McNeil and Braden Huff to Chaze Harris.

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1. Vanderbilt slogs past Memphis, stays perfect

No. 13 Vanderbilt entered Wednesday as one of the sport’s dominant teams, unbeaten with a high-powered offense (95.4 ppg, 5th among D-I schools) and five wins by at least 25 points.

So maybe it was due for a grinding, gritty victory.

A 77-70 overtime win at Memphis marked its most challenging victory of the season, both for Vandy’s errors (20 turnovers) and inability score consistently (it shot 32% from the field and 19% from deep, both season lows).

The Commodores (11-0) led by double digits in the first half and the second half, only to let Memphis keep clawing away. Dug McDaniel (18 points) pushed Memphis to a five-point lead midway through the second half, and forced OT when Abdul Hakim scored a layup with 62 seconds remaining. Duke Miles (22 points) helped Vandy get it together in OT.

“This wasn’t pretty,” Vandy coach Mark Byington said. “But to have the resiliency and toughness to come back on the road in this environment, I was impressed with the team.”

Two more wins, and it’ll be Vandy’s first time without a loss during non-conference play since 2007-08. That team started 16-0, finished 26-8 and earned a 4 seed in the NCAA Tournament.

So, could Vandy be the SEC’s best team? It’d be unfair to cast dispersions after one game, especially since it’s the highest-rated SEC program on KenPom (10), Torvik (8) and EvanMiya (10) and in the AP Poll. But Memphis highlighted worrisome aspects of Vandy’s game, most notably applying pressure defense. The Commodores didn’t handle that well, and Byington knows it.

If they’re not hitting 3s or creating easy scoring chances inside, it’s a grind. And grinding vs. SEC teams won’t be like grinding vs. Memphis.

2. Did we get a clue about Big East hierarchy?

UConn and St. John’s are the best teams in the Big East. The rest of the league remains a bit of mystery. But we got some clarity on Wednesday night.

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