Vanderbilt took down Virginia Tech 80-64 and moved to 8-1 on the season as it started what will end up as an important non-conference road swing.

Here's some takeaways from that effort.

It won’t look great on the rèsumè, but a power-five road win is a power-five road win

Virginia Tech is among the lowest-ranked teams that Vanderbilt will play throughout this non-conference slate and likely won’t be a team that helps to bolster Vanderbilt’s rèsumè, but beating a power-five team on the road means something.

That’s the first time Vanderbilt has gone on the road in head coach Mark Byington’s tenure and saw it win decisively in a game that it expected to win. That’s progress.

Byington said months ago that he wouldn’t truly know the mental makeup of his team until he saw how they responded in game situations on the road.

It wasn’t all smooth sailing for Vanderbilt, but it found a way to win decisively against a power-five team on the road. That feels like a passed test.

MJ Collins got his revenge

Collins had an edge about him on Wednesday night as he walked into his previous home that was palpable.

The former Virginia Tech guard went for 15 points on Wednesday with all of them coming as a spark to Vanderbilt in the first half. The 6-foot-4 guard shot 5-for-12 from the field and seemed to step into the spotlight of playing against his former team.

Collins has been streaky throughout Vanderbilt’s first nine games of the season–and even was on Wednesday–, but has microwave scorer ability like few others on Vanderbilt’s roster. He’s also got confidence that appears to be on a different level than it was the last time he stepped into Cassell Coliseum.

Wednesday offered a glimpse into what Collins offer for Vanderbilt when it’s all flowing.

Tyler Nickel’s return wasn’t as pretty, it was a continuation of his slump

Nickel expected a harsh welcome in his return, but didn’t quite fulfill the villain role on Wednesday.

The Vanderbilt wing went for just six points on Wednesday on 2-of-7 shooting and seemed to struggle defensively at times.

That performance wasn’t an outlier for Nickel, who has fallen short of double figures in four of Vanderbilt’s last five games.

Vanderbilt will need to lean on Nickel if it’s gonna win SEC games, perhaps a positive lens offers the thought of the slump coming now rather than in SEC play as encouraging. A negative one questions how long it will be before Nickel gets on a roll.

Tyler Tanner’s floor game is starting to show up

The Vanderbilt freshman guard did just about everything–but defend–at Brentwood Academy, the skillset that he showed there is starting to show up at Vanderbilt.

Tanner has been a factor for Vanderbilt in the early part of the season by playing his role as a three-and-D guy, but is starting to become more of an initiator in addition to that role.

The 6-foot guard showed that off a bit on Wednesday as he put it on the floor to get to a floater and sliced through the lane for a layup later in the night

Where is the role for Alex Hemenway?

Hemenway was available tonight for the first time this season after missing the first eight games with an injury, but still didn’t see the floor for Vanderbilt.

A source indicated that the plan for the veteran wasn’t necessarily to be a factor on Wednesday night, but the sixth-year guard not being involved at all seems to beg the question; when and where does his role come.

Vanderbilt seems to have a rotation set and it’s winning. It’s hard to want to mess with that by throwing a guy out there who hasn’t worked extensively with his teammates on the floor over the last few months.

Rebounding is an issue and it's not going away

It’s probably time to call it a rebounding problem.

Vanderbilt has now been outrebounded in six of its last seven games with the only exception coming Friday against Tennessee Tech. Three of those six games in which Vanderbilt was outrebounded came against non power-five opponents.

On Wednesday, the Commodores were outrebounded 37-27 by Virginia Tech and gave up 11 second-chance points as a result of 14 offensive rebounds. Virginia Tech’s frontcourt of Mylyjae Poteat and Ben Burnham outrebounded Vanderbilt’s group of Devin McGlockton and Jaylen Carey 13-5 on the evening, as well.

That’s not a recipe for success, but it’s probably something that Vanderbilt will have to play through the rest of the year if its size and existing data points are any indication.

To overcome the rebounding deficiencies–and the frontcourt deficiencies as a whole–Vanderbilt will have to take care of the ball and make shots

Through its first nine games, Vanderbilt has done that for the mostpart.

On Wednesday that was the case as the Commodores shot 52.7% from the field as opposed to Virgina Tech’s 38.3% and turned it over just eight times.

Vanderbilt also converted Virginia Tech’s 15 turnovers into 28 points.

The game on Wednesday was won in the backcourt for Vanderbilt, which saw its guards outscore Virginia Tech’s 57-29 on the day behind 15 from Collins and 19 from Jason Edwards.

If Vanderbilt is going to get to its benchmarks this season, then it feels as if that sentence will have to be uttered a few times. It’s a guards’ game, and it’s going to have to be often with the way this team is constructed.

On Wednesday it was.