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Did Q do this last year?

Stackhouse did a mic drop in the presser but I got him 1-on-1 after.

Stack said that it was a clean break in his lower leg, no damage to Liam's ankle. Vanderbilt was concerned there would be. Doesn't have a timetable but said something about three months. Said he definitely won't be ready for pre-draft stuff but he may be able to get back to work out for teams at training camp. Stack was really hoping he'd be able to get in those pre-draft workouts to show off his touch and speed.

They aren't sure if he'll be feeling well enough to be at senior day yet, Liam is hoping to make it.

Barrett Sallee
CBS Sports

The NCAA Football Rules Committee announced Friday that it has approved several rules designed to speed up college football games in an attempt to control the flow of the game and provide more consistency for in-game management. Once approved in April by the NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Panel, the rules will be implemented for the 2023 season with the committee monitoring how they impact the game, specifically the number of plays run in each contest.

The biggest change is regarding first downs. Currently, the clock stops on first downs until the ball is spotted by officials. The new rule will keep the clock running on first downs except during the final 2 minutes of the second and fourth quarters. This will emulate the current rule in the NFL.

CBS Sports' Dennis Dodd pointed out last month that the model that college football currently uses has been in place since 1968.

"This rule change is a small step intended to reduce the overall game time and will give us some time to review the impact of the change," said Georgia coach Kirby Smart, co-chair of the committee.

Among the other rule changes the committee has initially approved:

• No consecutive timeouts: This mostly impacts field goals attempts when opposing coaches call multiple timeouts in order to "ice the kicker."
• Untimed penalties: Rules violations that occur with no time on the clock in the first and third quarters would carry over to the next quarter, thus limiting "untimed downs" to the end of the halves.
• Replay adjustments: During games in which there isn't a replay official in the booth, on-field officials will have optional replay in which they can use available video after a coach's challenge.

The committee also clarified a couple current rules. Drones will not be allowed over the playing surface or team area when teams are on the field, and teams will not be able to warmup ahead of the second half until the field is cleared.

Of the top 5 teams in the SEC standings , they’ve played 3 of them twice (AL, TN and KY) and the other two on the road (TX AM and MO) losing to AM by 6 and MO by 3.

And they still are 10-7 with chance to finish tied for 3rd.

Just think about that. They’ve played the toughest schedule of any SEC team (I’ve not checked this out for sure but how can it not be) and still might finish tied for 3rd.

Pretty amazing. And could do all that and still not make the tourney. How is that possible

Got a request awhile back to chart Vanderbilt’s résumé building opportunities and current résumé throughout the season. Will eventually move to the NET rankings, which is what the Quad system is based on, but the sample size is too small for those at the moment. So these are referencing KenPom. Will try to update this early on each week. (Now Updated with NET rankings instead of KenPom)

Vanderbilt’s Current KenPom ranking: 80
Started the season at: 62 (NET) 66 (KenPom)
Net Ranking: 81

Record in:
Q1: 5-11
Q2: 5-0
Q3: 4-2
Q4: 5-1

Memphis: Quad 1 (Loss)
Southern Miss: Quad 3 (Loss)
Temple: Quad 2 (Win)
Morehead State: Quad 4 (Win)
Saint Mary's: Quad 1 (Loss)
Fresno State Quad 3 (Win)
At VCU: Quad 1 (Loss)
Wofford: Quad 4 (Win)
Pittsburgh: Quad 2 (Win)
Grambling State: Quad 4 (Loss)
NC State: Quad 1 (Loss)
Alabama A&M: Quad 4 (Win)
Southeastern Louisiana: Quad 4 (Win)
South Carolina: Quad 4 (Win)
At Missouri: Quad 1 (Loss)
At Tennessee: Quad 1 (Loss)
Arkansas: Quad 1 (Win)
Alabama: Quad 1 (Loss)
At Georgia: Quad 3 (Win)
Kentucky: Quad 1 (Loss)
At Texas A&M: Quad 1 (Loss)
At Alabama: Quad 1 (Loss)
Ole Miss: Quad 3 (Win)
Tennessee: Quad 1 (Win)
At Florida: Quad 1 (Win)
At South Carolina: Quad 3 (Win)
Auburn: Quad 2 (Win)
At LSU: Quad 3 (Loss)
Florida: Quad 2 (Win)
At Kentucky: Quad 1 (Win)
Mississippi State: Quad 2 (Win)
Neutral vs LSU: Quad 3 (Win)
Neutral vs Kentucky: Quad 1 (Win)
Neutral vs Texas A&M: Quad 1 (Loss)

Games remaining (regular season):
Q1 games: 0
Q2 games: 0
Q3 games: 0
Q4 games: 0

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Exchanged a few messages with CPA (Tenn.) LB target Crews Law, who was back at Vanderbilt to check out spring practice on Thursday.

On what stood out during his visit: "The energy and competitiveness of the team. The coaching staff stood out as well. It was definitely good to see how they coach. It makes it feel more like what the reality of being on the team would be like than just regular recruiting visits."

Law said his relationship with Vanderbilt's coaching staff is "good for sure" and that he talks to them on a regular basis.

He told me he is going to North Carolina this weekend and also has trips planned to Wisconsin, Kentucky, Miss. State, Virginia Tech, Notre Dame, and Ole Miss. Possible trips to Stanford and USC as well.

Law also noted that he plans to be back at Vanderbilt at some point as well.

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We’re making Missouri a lock. Based on results, there is no good reason to keep the Tigers out now. The only reason we’ve been cautious — and it is a fair enough reason, honestly — is that Missouri’s predictive metrics have never quite matched up with the actual wins and losses on their resume. The BPI thinks this is the 63rd-best team in the country! Strength of Record, on the other hand, has this team ranked 18th. Even if you split the difference, Missouri is in good shape, and in any case a little close analysis (see all the single-digit wins over Quadrant 3 and 4 teams like South Carolina, Southern Indiana, Southeast Missouri, and Penn) can help the committee untangle why Missouri could have the record it has (and the dearth of bad losses) and still not rate out all that highly in the core NET. The Tigers’ actual seed might be hampered by some of these numbers, but it would be crazy for the committee not to select them.

The same is true for Arkansas, but for totally opposite reasons. Arkansas is like the anti-Mizzou. Inverse Mizzou. Mizzou with an evil goatee. The metrics here are all fantastic, except for Strength of Record, which breaks with the top 15 team vibe given out by the predictive stuff and instead ranks Arkansas 40th. The wins and losses are a good bit less flattering. The Razorbacks have three Quadrant 1 wins: neutral-court versus San Diego State, at Kentucky Feb. 7, home versus Texas A&M, plus a just-OK Quad 2 record (4-2) and a road loss to LSU in Quadrant 3. Still: Those wins are probably enough for a major conference team with underlying numbers this good. It’s really hard to imagine Arkansas missing out in the end.

Locks: Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas Kentucky, Texas A&M, Missouri
Work to do: Auburn, Mississippi State, Vanderbilt

Auburn (19-11, 9-8; NET: 37, SOS: 27): The Tigers played great at Alabama Wednesday night, as well as they’ve played all season, and in an environment and atmosphere — not just among the fans but between the two sets of players, too — that made Alabama-Auburn feel like one of the college hoops game’s great rivalries. We’ll take all of that they got. Unfortunately for Auburn, the fantastic performance did not result in a win, which is all that really matters at this stage of the season, particularly for a team with so few quality victories on its resume thus far. Auburn beat Arkansas at home. It beat Northwestern on a neutral floor. Those are the two Quadrant 1 wins, and the rest of the victories in other quadrants don’t get any more impressive from there. The Tigers have lost eight of their last 11, and desperately need to change the pattern Saturday at home against Tennessee.

Mississippi State (20-10, 8-9; NET: 43, SOS: 49): Mississippi State continues to head — haltingly, sometimes imperceptibly — closer toward the NCAA Tournament. Beating South Carolina Tuesday night doesn’t exactly change the game, but avoiding losing to South Carolina kept the Bulldogs where they were before the night began, which is maybe the First Four? Maybe the last four byes? This team’s mix of nonconference performance (albeit against a bad noncon schedule) and late-season performance in the SEC (and against TCU) has made it one of the strongest finishers on the 2023 bubble. It has just one more regular season game to keep things moving, Saturday at …

Vanderbilt (17-13, 10-7; NET: 84, SOS: 17): Vanderbilt?! Yes, Vanderbilt. Talk about strong finishers: The Commodores have won seven of their past eight, including wins over Tennessee and, as of Wednesday night, at Kentucky. All of a sudden, they’re at least worth a bubble look. That NET number is pretty rough, sure, and the bad losses (two in Quadrant 3, one to Grambling State at home in Quadrant 4) are pretty gross. But this team has won three high-level Quad 1 games and is 4-1 against Quadrant 2, with a chance to pick off Mississippi State Saturday and head into the SEC tournament with some real bubble momentum. It would take some real doing; this is probably the farthest end of our bubble right now. But stranger things have happened.

I think we already knew this, but now it’s official. A leg fracture isn’t worst case scenario for him, I’d think?

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How crazy different is NET and RPI

VU is 84 in NET and Rutgers is 38

VU is 44 in RPI and Rutgers is 90

VU would probably be a 9 or 10 seed prediction my most bracket folks right now if they were using RPI and Rutgers wouldn’t be in the field and maybe not even in most folks bubble watches.

Just the opposite of today.

KPI is up to 44 which is a really good number for an at large bid. SoR is up one spot to 54.

VU fans just have to hope result based metrics are given strong considerations. If so and they can win the next two I like VUs chances ( assumming their first SEC game is vs a bottom 4, if they somehow get the 4 seed and avoid a game vs bottom 4 then that game becomes less important as one it’s a day later when more decisions have already been made and 2 if they lost it more than likely wouldn’t knock them down too much, may give them a chance though for another win over a tourney or bubble team which at that point would maybe give them something. To gain)

I really have no idea though how much if any emphasis is put on the result based metrics.

Just took their 4th Q3 loss (and MN is ranked 240, a road loss to 241 becomes a Q4 loss)

And somehow they are a 9/10 seed by many experts and now they are 18-12 overall. Of course their Net is 32 and they are 6-6 in Q1. But only 3-2 in Q2 and 2-4 in Q3. 7-0 in Q4 as long as MN stays a Q3.

Another resume right there with VU.

And their KPI is 43 and SoR 49 and both should drop after tonight’s loss.

Having a hard time finding a link to the replay. Much appreciated if someone could provide a link.

I got to catch about half of practice today. It was in shells and there was a good amount of 7-on-7 and 11-on-11 scrimmage work. Here is what I saw.

OFFENSE
Here’s my stab at a first-team depth chart. Full disclosure—this is my opinion based about 85% on what I’m seeing and 15% gut feeling. So, if you snuck a glimpse of practice the last two days and are thinking, “Wait! But I saw this guy running first team yesterday and he’s not on your list!” Then my response would be “It’s spring practice and you see a lot of mixing and matching.
I have an idea of the second team but it’s not fully-formed and there’s more rotating there and so I’d rather wait another practice or two rather than get it wrong.
Anyway…

QB AJ Swann
RB Patrick Smith
WR Will Sheppard
WR Quincy Skinner
WR Jayden McGowan
TE Cole Spence
LT Gunnar Hansen
LG Delfin Xavier Castillo
C Julian Hernandez
RG Bradley Ashmore
RT Junior Uzebu

• If I were to replace one guy, it might be McGowan with WR Gamarion Carter. I can’t recall seeing McGowan out there but I didn’t try to verify that either; his name came up in conversation post-practice and it occurred to me that I hadn’t noticed him doing anything the first two practices and that’s unusual. Carter had a nice catch or two today for long gains (one from QB Drew Dickey) and McGowan had some ball security issues last year. So, way-too-early observation but that’s something I’ll watch.
• Backup QB Ken Seals threw the ball pretty well today when I saw him.
• TE Logan Kyle made a long play or two. Tight ends coach Justin Lustig said they’re trying to get him to 225 and he’s not there yet (he said he was 223) but that it appears he’s not lost speed. So I’m interested to see what kind of role he could have as a pass-catcher.
• For whatever it’s worth, they’ve developed a nice corps of walk-on wideouts, which includes Landon Wells, Richie Hoskins, Hutch Baird and Wilson Long, with Hoskins and Long looking like the top two in the group. I’m not saying any of these guys are going to do huge things, but I’ve seen scholarship wide receivers here worse than Long, for sure. The bigger point of importance here is that they are trying hard to improve their walk-on program, which is important because it gives you more competitive practices and also prevents you from grabbing a random person on campus to fill a big role late in the season, not that this would ever happen.

DEFENSE
My crack at starters:
Star Darren Agu
DT Daevion Davis
DT Christian James
DE Nate Clifton
LB Kane Patterson
LB Ethan Barr
Anc CJ Taylor
CB Ja’Dais Richard
CB BJ Anderson
FS De’Rickey Wright
SS Jaylen Mahoney

• I did see Davis out there for a spell today, I’d noted on Tuesday that I didn’t remember seeing him getting any snaps.
• Defensive highlight of the day: S Marlen Sewell picked QB Walter Taylor and it’s probably a pick-6 if it plays out.
• LB Nick Rinaldi is a true linebacker now. Rinaldi played the star position last year. If you recall last year, Rinaldi was a tremendous athlete who started playing HS football as a senior and was a star immediately. He walked on to Vanderbilt and was actually getting defensive reps in spots of SEC games that were still in doubt last year, which is pretty tremendous for a walk-on with a year of experience. They really love him and his work ethic and he’ll be a big help on special teams.
• Stanford transfer Aeneas DiCosmo is getting some reps at the star spot. I’m not sure how much the’ll want Taylor off the field but I think he’ll get some time.
• BJ Diakate, who played some at anchor last year and is still in that role, has been sidelined though I can’t spot anything that looks serious and it could be load management.
• Vanderbilt is listing Agu as just “DE” and so my assumption that he’s in the “anchor” spot could be wrong. They list several other guys at LB/DE, which is how they code that on the roster. I’ll see if I can follow up here.

This and that

• Former Vandy/NFL offensive linemen Will Holden and Chris Williams were there. Holden was there Monday and I’ve seen Williams around a lot since Clark Lea has been the coach.
• Today’s post-practice speaker was David Cutcliffe, the former Ole Miss and Duke coach who now works for the SEC. He’s a liaison between the conference office and the coaches, and, as someone from the school said to me, seems to understand the value that Vanderbilt can add to the league by being good. He got a nice ovation and spoke with a player or two afterwards.
• There’s another practice on Saturday but it will not be a scrimmage. It’s the same time as the baseball game with a ranked Maryland team and I’ll be covering the baseball game instead. I’ve tried to see if I can get someone to go in my place but no luck so far.

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Having lived on the west coast for 5-6 years I came to appreciate In n Out. It’s a really good burger. Fries are trash but a really good burger and shake. Excited for this.

Illinois over Michigan
SMU over Memphis
Purdue over Wisconsin
UCLA over Arizona State

Among the possible elimination games on Saturday will be
Boise State vs. Utah State
Oklahoma State vs. Texas Tech

If we win on Sat…

1) and UK & TN BOTH lose, we would be in a three-way tie for 3rd

2) and either UK or TN loses, then we would be tied for 4th.

Anyone know how we would do in the tiebreakers? Is a double-bye even a possibility?

Anyone have extras? I may need two in addition to mine.

GREAT win. Just awesome. Can they keep this up without Robbins. I don’t know. Going to be tough. Get great D out of Q I think they can.


And they should be back on the bubble. Screw the computers.

I’ll put it this way. If VU doesn’t deserve to be in the tournaments then the SEC sure doesn’t deserve 7 or 8 teams. No way.

And I’m saying this as my opinion. I know historically with VUs resume its still doubtful