Welcome to Crazy, everyone. It’s unthinkable, unimaginable, incredibly unrealistic, and crazy.
Bigger than Buster Douglas or Broadway Joe and the Miracle on Ice. That’s bigger than North Carolina State over Phi Slamma and Villanova Has Done It, and bigger than any upset in the history of any sport.
If you don’t believe in miracles now, how else can you explain Vanderbilt No. 40 and Alabama No. 2 No. 35?
The SEC’s annual tomato can, perhaps the worst FBS/Division I team in modern college football, beat the greatest team of modern times — and not just beat them, beat them physically. How else would you explain that?
Alabama’s team defeated rival Georgia State seven days ago and was immediately elevated to a comfortable position at the top of the college football world under new coach Karen DeBoer.
And then he got knocked out — not knocked off, but knocked out — by Vanderbilt. For the love of all things Saban, Vanderbilt!
“God gave me a vision when I was little,” Vanderbilt powerhouse quarterback Diego Pavia told the SEC Network shortly after the most shocking upset since Lazarus. “Games like this are life-changing.”
How else do you explain it?
How else to explain how Vanderbilt, which had lost all 60 games in program history against top-five opponents, scored the first 13 points, led by as many as 16 points and never trailed?
I will never follow you.
How else to explain why a team that lost to Georgia State last month stole the ball with nearly three minutes left and took a wild swing to protect a precarious one-point lead and run out the clock against powerhouse Alabama?
When the final drive arrived, the decision was three running plays and no punt as Vanderbilt faced history. Grasp the game with guts and squeeze the life out of it.
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After four first downs, the Commodores beat Alabama for the first time since 1984, soaking in a field of humanity in Nashville, the pint-sized quarterback wondering who he was looking for, someone to hug. He ran around the field like that.
Five games into the Vandy season, Pavia has yet to commit a turnover.
“In so many ways, he embodies the program that we’re building,” Vanderbilt coach Clark Lee said.
The same program that faltered at the end of last season, going 2-10 in its last nine SEC games as an underdog. In other words, the same old Vandy.
So Lear changed the framework for the rebuild, hiring former New Mexico State University coach Jerry Kill as assistant head coach and fixer. Kill brought offensive coordinator Tim Beck on board and convinced Pavia, who led NMSU to 10 wins in 2023, including a rout of Auburn, to play where no one else has.
And they encountered this once-in-a-lifetime moment in a stadium full of Alabama fans who had purchased Vanderbilt season tickets to ensure their seats at the game. In this first game, they didn’t blink.
It was their first win against a top-ranked team and their first time against a top-five team, scoring 40 points. In four games against former Alabama coach Nick Saban, Vanderbilt totaled 13 points.
The Commodores scored 13 points in the first quarter Saturday afternoon.
By the time Vanderbilt fans flooded the field, Pavia threw for 252 yards, scored two touchdowns, and ran for 56 yards on 20 grueling carries.
When he preached divine intervention in everything, Pavia was ahead of Alabama’s star quarterback Jalen Milroe — who took control of the Heisman Trophy race a week earlier.
But it wasn’t just Pavia. This was a true blue team victory in the era of Me First NIL nonsense.
Eli Stowers, a former backup quarterback at Texas A&M turned tight end at Vanderbilt, played like an All-American with six catches for 113 yards.
Vanderbilt’s offensive line, a decades-long weakness in a conference that revolves around success at the line of scrimmage, did not allow a sack.
“We spent everything we had,” Leah said.
Lee arrived at his alma mater as a coach in December 2020, when the world was in turmoil as it navigated a global pandemic. Amid growing uncertainty on and off the field, he declared his goal at Vanderbilt was to win a national title.
National flip title. At Vanderbilt.
This was an absolutely ridiculous comment for a program that is not only one of the worst in the sport, but one that isn’t even committed to spending the money needed to keep pace in its own conference.
But as the football facility was built and stadium renovations began, Vanderbilt found itself losing its last nine league games and Lee could have easily been fired at the end of last season.
Then Kill, Beck, and Pavia arrived and everything changed.
Something unthinkable, unbelievable, unreal happened.
“There’s more to us than this,” Lee said. “This is not the end. Let’s go get more.”
Welcome to Crazy, everyone. That is extremely unrealistic.
Matt Hayes is a senior national college football writer for USA TODAY Sports Network. Follow him on X @MattHayesCFB.
