Has an era died?

NASHVILLE—There were scattered boos as the clock ran down in Vanderbilt’s 66-45 loss to Tennessee at Memorial Gymnasium on Saturday, and they didn’t escape coach Jerry Stackhouse’s attention.

The boos weren't really directed at the players. They were over the shock of seeing The Streak go by the wayside. That streak is almost as dear to some as Memorial itself. After 1,080 consecutive games of the Commodores hitting a 3-pointer, fans watched in horror as players settled for lay-ups and dunks instead of 3s. After watching 25 attempts clank off the iron, maybe you couldn't blame them.

""The fans were more concerned about the 3s than us really even getting baskets. ... I felt for those kids," Stackhouse said in VU's post-game press conference.

Stackhouse's job is to look after players. I have no issue with what he perceives as mis-placed frustration. His team's already a fragile bunch. For fans to expect those players, mired in their own misery, to understand what The Streak means to an equally-fragile fan base, is indeed is a misplaced expectation.

Still, it meant something to a lot of other folks. These two sum it up best:

Vanderbilt has always had shooters. For my dad's generation, that was Tom Hagan, Terry Compton and the F-Troop, among others. My childhood winters weren't complete without trips to Memorial to watch Mike Rhodes, Phil Cox, Scott Draud, Barry Booker, Barry Goheen and Charles Mayes. Vanderbilt's last SEC regular-season championship was built on the backs of Billy McCaffrey, Ronnie McMahan, Bruce Elder, Kevin Anglin and Frank Seckar, and shortly after that, Drew Maddux. Kevin Stallings' best teams spread the floor and knocked off giants with Shan Foster and John Jenkins sniping away.

Facing Vandy was like playing a perpetual game of Whack-a-Mole in trying to guard all those shooters. And then there was the night Shan Foster went bananas on Mississippi State by himself:

A week ago, The Streak was in the hands of Aaron Nesmith, who led the country in 3-point shooting. Then Nesmith broke his foot, the Commodores are 10-for-75 behind the arc without him, and the only streak anyone is going to remember now is Vandy's 24-game skid against SEC opponents.

Where are the shooters?

Place the blame primarily on Stackhouse's predecessor, Bryce Drew, who dreamed of turning Vanderbilt into something of a Kentucky-South, spreading the floor with better athletes than everyone and executing a dribble-drive offense. While the talent Stallings left behind wasn't his best, it also was neither appreciated nor fully utilized by Drew. Drew had no use for holdover Cam Justice and little use for Stallings recruit Payton Willis and ran both off. Drew's failings were many, but among them, he failed to understand how Vandy won, and consequently lost his last 20 games at VU before losing his job.

But today's frustration wasn't just about this.

This surviving streak has launched a fan misery like VU has never seen. It worsened with an epic fail of a football season last fall. It turned to anger with VU kept football coach Derek Mason, who was plenty responsible for wreckage in his own way. The Mason mess is primarily on ex-athletic David Williams, who essentially gave Mason an ironclad contract through 2020 (at least).

And anger isn't always rational. Now, that anger has built for so long, it's become a forest fire that just devours what's there, as Stackhouse, and almost certainly, AD Malcolm Turner (who hired him) are finding out.

Again, don't blame Stackhouse for this mess. Four or five SEC wins with Nesmith would have been a real accomplishment with this roster; now, I can't find one. And while the sprit of the criticism below isn't fair, there's something there Stackhouse needs to grasp:

Stackhouse came to Vanderbilt with the expectation he'd develop players, so much to the extent that he pulled assistants off the road to help with that this summer. But to classify this team's talent as "mid-major" is probably being kind. Even if Notre Dame transfer D.J. Harvey helps next year, it won't come close to offsetting the probable loss of Nesmith to the NBA. The early returns in recruiting haven't been good, and with the first signing period done, there aren't many players out there who can help, and probably no more than two or three scholarships to offer anyway.

That makes the 2021 signing class, along with the ability to add an impact transfer or two, critical, less the last two seasons become the new norm.

The coming months are also critical for Turner, who made a risky hire if for no other reason that Stackhouse hadn't recruited before.

That unknown quality now has the potential to either make, or break, both.

Turner is also under pressure to fundraise and build campus support for facilities improvements. He then must sell that to a testy fan base that doesn't know what to think of him. The fan base also has issues trusting his employer, which are compounded by the fact that the two people it put in charge of fixing the problem have yet to celebrate a one-year anniversary in those roles.

But mostly, Saturday wasn't about Stackhouse, or Turner, or the players. It was about a dwindling fan base mourning the loss of something sacred that'll it'll never get back.

The losing has been brutally tough on the fan base. That's nothing new for Vanderbilt fans. But between university neglect of the fan base and a program within reach of the worst losing streak in league history, these are new depths. I felt like I'd seen everything in covering this program, but Saturday, I sensed a palpable sense of sadness from fans, and even among people who work for Vanderbilt, that I'd never felt before. I also left with the feeling that the program's on life support.

The coming months will mean everything. Here's hoping Vanderbilt grasps what's at stake.