Vanderbilt Basketball’s Equalizer: The Three-point Shot

NASHVILLE – Vanderbilt’s offense has seemed to make itself more dangerous this season.

The Commodores have scored at a high rate this season and Wednesday night was no different. After scoring 105 in each of the first two games of the season, they put up 92 in a 30-point win over Eastern Kentucky. The story of Vanderbilt is not that they won by a wide margin against another mid-major team. The story is and has been through the first week of the season, of course, the offense. 

Vanderbilt has plenty of players that are able to drive to the basket, find an open man, spot up and shoot the ball. As a result of that, Vanderbilt has found a component of its offense that, if it keeps up at its current pace, makes itself more dangerous for a team when the games start to get more difficult: the three-point shot.

The three-point shot is the ultimate equalizer in basketball and has certainly become a big factor in how the sport is played at all levels in the present day. So far for Vanderbilt, the Commodores have maximized their opportunities on three-point shot opportunities, and done so at a consistently good rate through three games.

In Vanderbilt’s game against Eastern Kentucky Wednesday night, the Commodores hit 10 of their 28 three-pointer attempts (35.7 percent). In the three games so far this season, that is the worst performance from beyond the arc Vanderbilt has had. For Vanderbilt fans, that is a good sign when a team is shooting in the mid-30s percentage-wise while also hitting double-digit amounts of threes and it is considered the worst performance the team has had.

Realistically, shooting and making three-pointers at that pace is difficult to keep up. Vanderbilt will see some tough teams during non-conference and will see excellent teams when the calendar turns to January and conference play rolls around. In the first two games of the season, Vanderbilt hit 17 three-pointers against Lipscomb and 14 more at UCF on Saturday. If Vanderbilt is able to consistently keep a pace that is relatively close to what it is shooting at right now, the Commodores could elevate their potential in both the conference standings and in March.

It is the offense that Vanderbilt runs that helps open up the three-pointer opportunities that arise consistently. The Commodore offense is built through attacking the basket, getting into the paint. Once that is established, it opens up possessions for the opposing defense to collapse on the guy driving to the basket and leaving another guy wide open on the three-point line. Vanderbilt knows it has the ability to make threes, but the players also know how sneaky good the offense can get.

“I think it’s a very big threat. I think it starts with attacking downhill, and once we do that, everything else opens up and we’re able to get higher-quality shots,” Vanderbilt forward AK Okereke said.

In the previous game against UCF, Vanderbilt finished 8-for-12 in what head coach Mark Byington calls “paint threes,” which is a three-pointer attempt that comes from a player driving to the hoop before kicking it out to someone on the three-point line.

“Our spacing has been pretty good,” Byington said. “I think we’re getting to the point and driving the ball and making the defense collapse and then making a decision after that. That’s been a strength of ours.”

Time will tell if or how Vanderbilt sustains its current shooting rates. With the schedule getting more challenging as the year progresses, it will be an interesting metric to follow up on and track. But one thing that is for sure right now is the three balls are going in at a good rate and has gotten Vanderbilt’s offense off to an impressive start to the campaign.

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