Exclusive: Why Mark Byington's Mentor Bobby Cremins Is Amazed At Byington's Tenure As Vanderbilt Basketball Coach – Sports Illustrated

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NASHVILLE—In the months following Mark Byington taking the Vanderbilt job, Bobby Cremins anticipated that it would be the biggest challenge that his protegee had faced in his young career. 
Cremins acknowledged that times had changed in Division-I sports at that point and that Clark Lea had proven that winning was possible at Vanderbilt after beating No. 1 Alabama, but he sent out a reminder that this wasn’t the midmajor level anymore. He said that Vanderbilt would have to equip Byington properly and be patient with Byington as he worked to rebuild a program that had finished 9-23 the season prior. 
Vanderbilt didn’t need to be as patient with Byington as Cremins thought, though. 
“He’s been unbelievable,” Cremins told Vandy on SI. “I knew he was good. But, I didn’t know he was that good.” 
Byington has led Vanderbilt to two NCAA Tournament berths in his first two seasons on West End and has simultaneously put the program back on the national radar. Vanderbilt was ranked in the AP Top 25 for 17 weeks throughout the 2025-26 season. The Commodores finished in the top four of the SEC before eventually securing a No. 5 seed and an appearance in the Round of 32 of the NCAA Tournament.
Had Tyler Tanner’s halfcourt shot gone in against Nebraska, Vanderbilt would’ve been playing in the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament for the first time in over a decade. 
Cremins has seen Vanderbilt basketball have success under his friends Eddie Fogler and C.M. Newton in the past, but he’d also been around long enough to have some level of skepticism in the way the program operated throughout its eight-year NCAA Tournament drought. He was proud of Byington and confident in his abilities, but he’s been blown away by the results. 
Byington and Cremins’ nephew, Jon Cremins–who has since left for the head coaching job at Georgia State–got their first breaks by working for Cremins at College of Charleston years ago, and now they’re demonstrating that he made the right hires all those years ago. 
“They have taken Vanderbilt basketball and completely turned it around, it’s amazing,” Cremins said. “Mark Byington is now considered one of the bright young coaches in the game.” 
Byington describes Cremins as a special person in his life and one of his biggest mentors along the way. Cremins says he tries to leave Byington alone, but that if Byington ever needs anything that he knows he can reach out. Sometimes, Cremins will still reach out to Byington to pick his brain and lend a helping hand. 
Cremins says he could tell Byington was the “package” early on in their time together and had been waiting for Byington to get an opportunity like this since Byington filled in for Cremins as the interim head coach at Charleston when Cremins took a leave. He loved the way Byington recruited. He could tell that he had a chance to run a good system. He liked everything about him, he said. 
He says he realized that Byington had something special brewing at Vanderbilt when his first team pulled off an upset early in SEC play, when Cremins thought winning in the league would be difficult. Cremins also raves about the year that Vanderbilt guard Tyler Tanner had in 2025-26 and appears to believe that he’s been developed the right way by Byington and company. With Tanner back for year three, Cremins appears to expect Byington to put together another winning season—which Cremins isn’t taking for granted.
“I can’t believe what they’ve done at Vanderbilt, I just can’t believe it,” Cremins said. “They’ve done it over such a short period.”
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Joey Dwyer is the lead writer on Vanderbilt Commodores On SI. He found his first love in college sports at nearby Lipscomb University and decided to make a career of telling its best stories. He got his start doing a Notre Dame basketball podcast from his basement as a 14-year-old during COVID and has since aimed to make that 14-year-old proud. Dwyer has covered Vanderbilt sports for three years and previously worked for 247 Sports and Rivals. He contributes to Seth Davis' Hoops HQ, Basket Under Review and Mainstreet Nashville.
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