Exclusive: Why Ace Glass Believes Breakout Showing at Memorial Gymnasium is Just The Beginning – Sports Illustrated

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NASHVILLE—T.O. Barrett showed his hand on the sideline as he leaned back half spun and rotated out after zipping a pass to Ant Brown. When Brown snapped a pass to Ace Glass on the wing, Barrett didn’t crash the glass. 
He put his hand out and motioned towards Vanderbilt’s student section. By the time the ball touched the net, Barrett was parallel to the T in Vanderbilt on the Memorial Gymnasium sideline. 
“Ah, man,” Barrett told Vandy on SI. “I put three up in the air and ran down the court. I knew it was good.” 
Barrett not crashing is entirely off brand considering the reputation he’s formed as Vanderbilt’s gritty, do it all point guard. It being Barrett who ran down the floor when Glass’ right-wing three went up wasn’t as much an indictment on Barrett as it was a jarring visual representation of the heater that Glass was on. 
That make was Glass’ fourth from 3-point range in the half and represented the near climax of the heater he was on. Glass nailed two out of the half. He made them from the corner. He made them off the bounce. He made them off the catch. He made a long two with Memphis guard Jayden Reid smothering him that may have been more impressive than any shot from 3-point range he made on Tuesday night. He made his heat check, a stepback on the left wing too. 
The latter two were likely ill advised, but Glass was feeling himself.
“I wasn’t even thinking,” Glass said. “For sure in the flow state.” 
Tuesday was Glass’ night and his introduction to Memorial Gymnasium. After a scoreless first half, Glass broke through for 23 points in the second half on 8-for-14 shooting from the field and 5-for-10 shooting from 3-point range overall. Glass was the game’s leading scorer and allowed Vanderbilt to turn a back-and-forth fight between it and Memphis into a knockout. 
Memphis tried everything to slow Glass, but he kept finding himself open and couldn’t miss when he got a look. When Glass did miss, he finished through contact later in the possession. Glass was on a heater that’s among Vanderbilt’s most memorable in the Mark Byington era. Barrett doesn’t recall seeing a heater like that in recent memory. Vanderbilt forward Sebastian Williams-Adams only recalls seeing his high school teammate Sam Humphries put on a show like Glass did Saturday. 
Had Glass gotten it going in the first half of Vanderbilt’s Tuesday win, he could’ve eclipsed the 30-point mark for just the second time in his college career. But, Barrett and company appear to put more stock into the fact that Glass went on a scoring run after a first half where it wasn’t there for him than they would have if Glass had his best all night. Glass attributes his bounceback to everyone else encouraging him to keep firing and his belief in visualization. Everyone else attributes Glass’ outburst more to his relentlessness as a scorer. 
“All we gotta do is keep putting our faith in him and trusting him,” Williams-Adams said. “Everyone seemed to trust him to knock down shots.” 
“It takes unbelievable character and mental toughness to do what just happened to him,” Vanderbilt coach Mark Byington said. “I went to him with about two minutes left to go in the first half and I said ‘you’ve gotta wash this and come back in the first half.’ That’s easier said than done, but he came out in the second half, didn’t pout and he came out was ready to play and he blew the game open in the second half. He was phenomenal in the second half.” 
Less than two hours after Byington put a bug into Glass’ ear to forget about what happened in his scoreless, three-turnover first half, he returned to the bench for the final time of the night with a Vanderbilt win all but in hand and a near standing ovation from the Memorial Gymnasium crowd. When Glass sat down, he was swarmed by Vanderbilt assistant coaches Rodney Terry, Rick Ray and Matt Bucklin as well as Vanderbilt forward Bangot Dak. He later emerged postgame with red fuzzy slippers on as if he owned the place. Glass considers Tuesday his best night at Memorial Gymnasium yet and declares that he won't forget it for a long time. 
But, Glass appears to believe that he’ll deliver a number of moments in this place between now and Vanderbilt’s home finale on March 6 that will make Tuesday merely one of many memorable showings. He laughs off the idea that this is an out of body heater for him and responds that he had a few of these a year ago while leading Washington State in scoring. Glass isn’t being cocky. He’s right. 
Glass was No. 6 in the country in off the bounce scoring rate as a freshman at Washington State and scored 16.4 points per game as a result. Glass also averaged 3.0 rebounds, 2.3 assists and 0.8 steals per game in his freshman season in Pullman. He shot 45.5% from the field, 36.4% from 3-point range and 88.2% from the free throw line. He also set the Washington State freshman scoring record by the time he left Pullman. 
Vanderbilt doesn’t need Glass to set any records in 2026-27, but he envisions having this type of night far more often than he has an off night. 
“100%,” Glass said in regard to the idea that Tuesday won’t be the only time a performance like this happens. “Every night, this is the goal.”
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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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