I had never been to an SEC basketball tournament, even the one at Gaylord in Nashville. For some reason, and perhaps Vandy's record in the tournament was the main reason, I never really had the gumption to sit through a dozen games that featured teams I cared very little about — and games that would basically do little more than remind me of how mis-matched VU was in the SEC.

So, my trip to Atlanta was an opportunity to see what I had missed all these years — and, as a photographer, to capture those special, unique moments of what is the best Vanderbilt basketball team in over a decade.

Another obvious reality of the SEC tournament is that, because of the nature of a four-day 12-team basketball tournament, it is the biggest event of the year for the Southeastern Conference. Because every single team is in attendance, every single athletics department and corresponding local media are there. You also see just about anyone who has ever coached in the conference, including Dale Brown, Joe Dean, Jr. C.M. Newton, Wimp Sanderson...you name it, they were there.

The experience was in many ways different than I had anticipated...but certainly one of the most memorable three days of my professional and personal life. Looking back, here are some of the highlights of my trip.

First of all, from the moment I first stepped into the Georgia dome, I realized that this was, first and foremost, a media event — not a fan event. The Georgia Dome is a cavern, even when doctored up for basketball. Even when the Blue Horde was in full attendance, the entire third deck was totally empty. At its loudest, the Dome was never very loud, and certainly never even remotely intimidating.

Convesely, the SEC tournament is basically a media orgy. There are probably over 100 photographers on hand at any time throughout the day. There isn't "Press Row", but rather four rows of media, sitting shoulder to shoulder, from one end of the court to the other. The Tennessean probably had 15 media people there, including all the usual suspects as well as many young pups whose job was to serve the needs of the writers.

And then there's the SEC media reps. First, these girls could all double as underwear models. Second, there must have been 100 of them, and their entire job was to walk back and forth along press row, asking if you needed anything and handing out stats and the latest game scores from around the nation (up to the minute accurate).

Twenty yards off of the court, there is a media work room that is equipped with media guides from every SEC team, today's sports pages from around the region, and without a doubt the kicking-est high speed wireless network I have ever experienced. Which is basically an essential, because virtually of all the writers and shooters are uploading every pixel of their shoots via the wireless network.

There are usually three rows of photographers on both ends of the court at every game. Among other things, that means the arena simply must be lit like a photographer's light box, because if the shooters all used strobes, it would look like a fireworks show. When The Super Bowl came to Atlanta, they doubled the luminance for the photographers, and that meant I could get good exposures without having to Photoshop the daylights out of every shot. Very cool — and likely very evident to you when you see the galleries.

To give you an idea of the size and stature of this event, the Associated Press employs two photographers for every game, one for each end of the court. These two shooters have the latest Canon digital camera, which can shoot 12 high-res photos per second, and whose image cache can hold more than 20 photos at a time. The camera employs dual compact flash cards, and uses one of the cards as a second cache to store images as you shoot them.

To put that into some historical perspective, today's sports shooter can shoot what used to be an entire roll of film in two seconds. Today's pro sports photographer can shoot more photos in 20 seconds than a film shooter could take in 10 minutes. In fact, these guys shoot so many images that the AP hires someone to do nothing but shuttle memory cards back and forth, from the floor to their staff of photo editors...who are sitting just off courtside, and are uploading edited game photos for immediate publication 10 minutes after they are shot. Astounding.

Anyone who doubts that the ditigal age has not fully arrived should attend one of these tournaments. There isn't a role of film in the building.

One of the real oddities of the SEC tournament is that, contrary to what you might think, as the field narrows the excitement level decreases. That is because everyone knows that every team left standing on Friday is guaranteed a slot in the NCAA tournament. In addition, most fans of losing teams go home, which makes the antiseptic atmosphere of the Georgia Dome even more drab and uneventful. One day I would like to shoot a mid-major tournament like the Missouri Valley or Mid-American, because I bet the final championship game is 180 degrees opposite to the SEC championship game.

The other obvious aspect that adds to the anticlimactic feel of the tournament is that there are more Kentucky fans there than all the other schools' fans combined. It's not so much that the fans impact the players the way they do in Rupp, but rather the sense that, as a non-UK fan, you are not really in the club. As the field narrows to "someone and UK", the feeling throughout the tournament is totally "been here, done this, going home."

When you are with the media, you hear all sorts of things, and believe me most of them are not good. When you see this tournament up close and personal, you cannot help but recognize the magnitude of what is at stake at this level — and I for one could see in real time how one player could make a massive difference in that setting.

Frankly, the questions were not about whether the SEC coaches cheat, but rather who is "the dirtiest." Vanderbilt never even entered any of these discussions, but you can guess which other schools were. Chris and I shared an hour of lunch with Willie Daunic, and when we discussed this topic he was totally dismissive of the very idea that the other 11 coaches don't cheat. In fact, he basically said that it isn't even a topic of discussion in the SEC anymore, because it's just an accepted fact — and a fact that most of the SEC media simply no longer care to discuss. (We had heard about Jaime Lloreda signing with an agent on Thursday, for example, which became common knowledge by Friday night — and yet the media insisted on continuing to pretend as though Lloreda was injured, even though most everyone knew he was in Panama playing semi-pro basketball at that very moment!)

As far as Vanderbilt, I can say that I have rarely been as proud of the school and its athletics department. Vandy may not have entered Atlanta with respect, but they certainly left with it. The team played unflinching, big time basketball. They man-handled an overmatched Ole Miss club, and then went toe to toe with Mississippi State with the entire media in full attendance. It was a match-up of two teams that everyone knew were here for a reason, and Vandy left the court with a scalp in its hand that made an indelible impression on everyone in attendance.

There were no snide jokes about the reorg in Atlanta, folks. Put simply, Vanderbilt belonged. They kicked ass and took names. In fact, many of the non-VU fans cheered for Vandy in the Florida game.

I'll close this retrospective with three anecdotes about this tournament that I hope will be especially meaningful to you fans of Vanderbilt.

• The Mississippi State game was probably the best game of the entire tournament, and as the evening contest was the best attended game that day. MSU's fans totalled at least 8,000, and some said it was closer to 12,000 — and they were there fully expecting to walk through to the rematch with Kentucky on Sunday.

Now, this was a great game to watch...but imagine watching it on the court! I mean, I must confess, the fan in me crept out in this game, and at times I just had to shake my head and say to myself, I cannot believe I am sitting here, at times six inches from the game itself! I mean, at times I was tossing an errant ball back out on the court! Heck, I had a couple of fantastic little chats during time outs with official Mike Stuart! Pinch me!

As the game proceeded into halftime, and then into the second half, I became mesmerized by the knowledge that I had been given a great privilege, to be here capturing this event. And this knowledge was made even more powerful because I had learned that neither Neil Brake (Vandy's photographer) nor Mike Strasinger (The City Paper) were there to shoot it. The Tennessean's fine photographer Eric Parsons and I were it, and I knew that it was important that I capture this game for all it was worth to Vanderbilt and to you, the fans.

With about five minutes to go, during a long TV timeout, Vandy was making its final run to tie the game toward the end of regulation. The atmosphere in the Dome was astoundingly profound in this moment, as everyone knew that they were watching two true heavyweights, and that the game was going to go right down to the wire. I remember glancing over to Chris on press row, and we both just grinned and shook our heads in awe — as if to say, Can you believe we are standing here experiencing this?!

I had stood to stretch my legs (after all, by that time, I had shot almost 1,500 photos), and it just so happened that Matt Freije was standing a few feet in front of me, gathering his thoughts in my corner of the floor. We both sort of turned toward each other at the same time, and our eyes met — and we both had that look on our faces of, this is it, it all comes down to the next three minutes. Well, Matt, clearly recognized me, and a small grin crept across his face! He sort of winked at me, as if to say, "This is pretty cool, eh?!" Definitely one of those moments that I, as a Vanderbilt fan, will never, ever forget.

• A second moment was after the MSU game in the media work room. It was too late to call my wife to celebrate (as if she'd care), and everyone else I knew had gone to bed. So I pulled out my cell phone, and dialed the one guy I knew would not only be up, but would want nothing more on earth than to talk with me about the game: Keith Cage.

What a thrill it was to talk to Keith about his son, and the team and the game from the Georgia Dome. We shared strategy thoughts, and talked about different plays, and then I told him I had taken a couple of shots of Dan that I was going to include in the game photo gallery solely because I knew he was sick to have not been able to be there to cheer Dan on. Every once in a while, all this hard work is totally worth it. That was one of those times.

• And finally, the third moment I will share was about three hours later. Chris and I stayed through the night at the Dome to get our various game stories and photos up for our subscribers. As the night crept into morning, all of the other media people — who had far more help and resources at their disposal — filed their stories and went back to their hotels. Eventually, the only media left were me and Chris Lee, clicking away on our laptops amidst stacks of tattered sports sections and coffee-stained media guides.

At about 1:00 am, a familiar face appeared in the media room: that of assistant coach Tom Richardson! The interviews were done, and the team had cleaned up — and Tom had realized that he was hungry! So he popped in to grab a couple of cookies, and took a moment to chat with me about the game and the next night's contest with Florida. It was one of those little times when the small Vanderbilt group of coaches, players and media was victorious, and we all felt as though we had done it together. For the first time, I think we all felt that maybe, at this moment, all the disappointment and discouragement of past losing streaks, embarassing blow-outs and contsant media criticism might actually have been worth it.

Congratulations kids, coaches, parents and fans. We've seen a lot of corners in our days, and somehow I think everyone feels this is one Vanderbilt may have finally turned.