Assist to Turnover

Vanderbilt: 2nd - 2.63

Nevada: 31st - 1.76



Bench PPG

Vanderbilt: 53rd - 33.25

Nevada: 284th - 18.00

This is something to watch. Nevada heavily relies on their starting group, who is taller. Could VU’s pace make a difference here late in the game?



Fast break points

Vanderbilt: 43rd - 17.25

Nevada: 271st - 8.25

Again, can the pace give Vandy an edge?



FG Percentage

Nevada: 30th - 51.69%

Vanderbilt 91st - 48.13%

Not a huge advantage here



Scoring Defense

Nevada: 36th - 61.2 PPG

Vanderbilt: 205th - 72.2 PPG

First real test for Nevada’s defense, and first real test for VU’s offense. Intriguing matchup



Scoring offense

Vanderbilt: 23rd - 91.5 PPG

Nevada: 120th - 81.8 PPG



Three Point Percentage

Nevada: 2nd - 48.61%

Vanderbilt: 310th - 27.87%

Likely where the game will be won or lost. Need a good shooting performance



All in all, this has the makings of a really good game. It will be interesting to see if Vandy’s depth/pace can wear Nevada down. Vandy will have to guard the three, while making some of their own on the other end. Nevada will be in the NCAA Tournament most likely, so this is not a must win, but it’d be a great one for the resume.

Vanderbilt practiced in it today, per source.

Believe the facility isn’t ready to be shown yet but is functional.

Which is two shiny pennies.

I’ve spoken to a few big check book donors. The same who tipped me off about last year nil surge. While I can not speak to the over all health of Vandy athletic (all sports) nil, it is my understanding Vandy will be operating with around 12 million in nil funds for football.

Now caveats.

I do believe the on hand cash is significantly better than last year.

NIL 12 million does not mean you have 12 million to burn in one year. 70% that year and 30% to carry over seems to be the “industry standard”. The IOUs seem to be less this year. Meaning more donors are willing to put up cash now vs see what happens.

Vandy will be flushing out 10-15 players on top of the graduates. The money seems to be mostly directly a beefing up the interiors in the portal. Finding 5 Hubbards is what I’ve been told is the goal. And Vandy is going to pay to make that happen. Running backs from a group of 5 with success on the field is also on the radar as a potential big ticket purchase. Everyone seems to recognize seddy on 1 leg has hurt this offense more than anything else. When healthy he keeps defenders honest on the mesh. Vandy need 2-3 legitimate running backs. Right now they have 1.

If pavia is able to win his case, I would anticipate his payout to be around 2 million. I would anticipate Johnson will transfer. If I had to guess who will get the first shot at being QB after Pavia 2025, ive been told St Hilaire will get the first shot. If Pavia loses his case, Johnson will be the penciled in starter for 25. I would anticipate Vandy will be in the market for graduate QB to be 1B going into summer.

There is a lot of buzz about Vandy nil pool right now. A lot of optimism that pavia will be back in 25 and Vandy will be using that as a recruiting pitch.

*this is all coming from boosters, it could be 100% accurate, it could be 20% accurate. Don’t shoot the messenger. Just enjoy being part of the money bag era*

Here as Hampton (1-2) looks to face Vanderbilt (4-0).

The Commodores are coming off a 29 point win over Butler.

Huge week for Vandy sports:

3 basketball games in the Charleston Classic. Thursday, Friday, and Sunday.

At LSU in football Saturday night.

Women’s soccer at FSU in the NCAA Tournament (Friday night).

The would you rather is….

Would you rather win all three games and win the Charleston Classic or beat LSU?

Very tough question for me but I think I’m going with the Charleston Classic. To get to 7-0 in hoops and sort of cement yourself as a potential NCAA Tournament team and top 25 contender, would be huge for the basketball program.

Fun 4 straight days with lots of Vandy sports coming up. Enjoy!

Does anyone know how the other quarterbacks who've not played this year have looked in training? Muschamp, etc.,

Very sad. Way too young.

I came across the box score of this game and for some reason had forgotten most of it. Vanderbilt makes a 4th quarter comeback to cut UT lead to five and gets the ball back with just over two minutes left. On first play, Cutler gets hit throwing and ball is intercepted (see 2:16:15 mark). Couple of questions...1) since Cutler is hit high, would that be a 15 yard penalty today and 2) if UT player went lower knowing today's rules, would Cutler have been able to get more motion in his throw to avoid interception? Wondering what could have been.

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VandyBoys:

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NFL:

Jordan Matthews: New England Patriots (Injured Reserve)

Zach Cunningham: Houston Texans

Andre Hal: Houston Texans

Casey Hayward: Los Angeles Chargers

Stephen Weatherly: Minnesota Vikings

Will Holden: Free Agent

Spencer Pulley: New York Giants

Wesley Johnson: Free Agent

Adam Butler: New England Patriots

Oren Burks: Green Bay Packers

Ralph Webb: New England Patriots (Practice Squad)

Trent Sherfield: Arizona Cardinals

CJ Duncan: Free Agent

Nifae Lealao: Free Agent

Caleb Scott: Seattle Seahawks (Practice Squad)

Jonathan Wynn: Free Agent

Tre Herndon: Jacksonville Jaguars

Emmanuel Smith: Free Agent

Kenny Ladler: Washington Redskins (Practice Squad)

NBA:

Luke Kornet: New York Knicks

Damien Jones: Golden State Warriors

Wade Baldwin: Portland Trailblazers

Festus Ezeli: Free Agent

If I have missed anyone, feel free to add them. @kerrigjl if you want to pin this up top, that would be awesome!!

Looks like LSU opened -11 and it's been bet down to LSU -7.5.

Man, it would be enormous to march into Baton Rouge and get a win.

Any word on injuries and if the bye week helped heel anybody up?

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – In his first collegiate season of competition, Vanderbilt sophomore kicker Brock Taylor has been named a semifinalist for the Lou Groza Collegiate Place-Kicker Award, presented by the Orange Bowl.

The award is presented annually to the nation’s top place-kicker by the Palm Beach County Sports Commission. The award is named for legendary Cleveland Browns kicker Lou Groza, who helped Cleveland to four NFL championships and was named NFL Player of the Year in 1954.

Taylor is one of 20 kickers on the semifinal list and one of just five on the list competing in their freshman or sophomore seasons. The semifinalists will be voted on by a panel of FBS head coaches, sports information directors, media members and past Groza Award winners to choose three finalists, with the winner then being announced at The Home Depot College Football Awards on ESPN on Dec. 12.

Taylor has made nine straight field goals for the Commodores and stands 16-for-19 on the season. His 31-yard field goal in his only attempt at Auburn moved him into second place for field goals made in a season at Vanderbilt.

The Knoxville, Tennessee, native drilled a school-record 57-yard field goal at Missouri as time expired in the first half. On the season, he’s made five from 50-plus, the most in a career by a Commodore. The five makes from 50-plus are tied for second-most in FBS this season and are the most in the SEC.

Taylor has twice earned SEC Special Teams Player of the Week honors. The first was following Vandy’s win over No. 1 Alabama when he connected on attempts from 51 and 33 yards in win, while also putting five of his eight kickoffs into the end zone for touchbacks. The second came a week later at Kentucky when he made both attempts from 49 and 50 yards, sent two kickoffs for touchbacks, and made a touchdown-saving tackle on a kickoff return in the third quarter.

He is the first Vanderbilt player to earn SEC weekly awards in consecutive weeks since quarterback Eric Jones in 1987.

Taylor and the Commodores return to action Saturday at LSU. Kickoff is set for 6:45 p.m. on SEC Network.

Now he’s fired from FAU. Less than 2 full seasons going 6-16. Once was the head guy at Texas.

Crazy times in college football. Clark Lea was nearly starring in an episode of the Walking Dead and he’s now in several coach of the year discussions. How quickly things can change.

Billy and I will be joined by Paul Grindstaff of Anchor Impact.

We'll start here in about 10 minutes.

Last night I attended a local athletic club meeting and our guest speaker was Joseph Goodman, Lead Sports Columnist for AL.com and he had some interesting comments about Vandy football and Candice Lee. First, he was covering the Alabama game from the Vandy press box and he said that his jaw was on the floor for the whole game because Vandy "completely manhandled" the Tide the whole game. He went on to discuss the effects of NIL and the transfer portal and specifically called out Vandy and Tulane as 2 programs that have changed their whole outlook due to these changes. He mentioned the comment HCCL made regarding how it was easier to get transfers into Vandy than HS kids (Goodman asked the question at the press conference about VU having so many transfers this season) and felt that this was a major change at VU that will make the program successful. He also said that he spoke last week with the VU Anchor Collective guy (he did not say the name) and this guy was flying all over the country speaking with alums about NIL and said the reaction he was getting was "like getting the band back together", so I would expect the funds for this next years' transfers to be there.

After the meeting I spoke with him for a few moments and he said that the main reason for the changes is Candice Lee, whom he called "brilliant". I know many will disagree, I am just relaying what he said. I actually challenged him and said that she initially wanted all NIL funds to be spread equally between male and female student-athletes and he responded that she knows that winning football funds NIL donations and her work in making changes to the transfer admissions policy was "brilliant". Our conversation ended as things were breaking up, but I was surprised that a sportswriter whose main role is to cover Alabama and Auburn knows so much about the VU athletic department, and he is very bullish on the future of the VU football program.

Finally, he spoke about the $22 million in revenue sharing payments that goes into effect next year and that for most P5 athletic programs $22 million is not enough to fund payments to all S-A's, male and female, all sports. The NCAA has not yet ruled on the future of the collectives, but he thinks that they will have to remain in place to keep things aboveboard, otherwise, the landscape will revert back to the under-the-table payments to S-A's that went on for years.

Is not good. VU may not win next week, but they should not go into the game intimidated.