Exclusive: Inside Davin Chandler's Move To Cornerback For Vanderbilt Football, Could He Stay There?
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NASHVILLE—When Vanderbilt walked off the field at Jordan Hare Stadium following its loss to Auburn, Davin Chandler was a safety that wasn’t taking cornerback reps. When it walked off the field in Athens, Georgia, a week later, Chandler was ninth on Vanderbilt’s roster in snaps. All of his snaps came at cornerback.
Chandler has since transitioned into a full-time cornerback–at least for now–and has become one of Vanderbilt’s most reliable corners.
“We were playing him at safety but gave him opportunities in man coverage and that’s how he became our nickel,” Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea said prior to Vanderbilt’s trip to Lexington. “I think as we were unsure a little bit about how we were covering and how we were closing space at corner, we made a decision to try him out on the edge. I think he’s held up really well.”
Chandler was approached by Vanderbilt defensive coordinator Steve Gregory ahead of Vanderbilt’s trip to Athens when Gregory proposed the idea of Chandler playing cornerback. The indication is that Gregory liked the way Chandler--whose first name is pronounced "Day-Vin" covered in man coverage situations in fall camp and wanted to see what Chandler could do with more attention diverted there.
Vanderbilt used Chandler in a total of 34 snaps–including a season-low three against Auburn–in his four games at safety despite a strong fall-camp showing, but Chandler has since eclipsed 34 snaps in every game since outside of Vanderbilt’s loss to Ole Miss. Chandler played a season-high 55 snaps a week later against Arkansas and 35 in Vanderbilt’s loss to Kentucky.
Gregory didn’t promise Chandler anything, but the path to playing time was more clear for him at corner than it was at his natural position. Chandler seemed to grasp that. Even if he didn’t, he wasn’t going to tell Gregory that.
“When he asked me, I was like ‘let’s rock out,’” Chandler told Vandy on SI on Thursday. “The conversation was good. Coach Gregory just let me know what it was and told me he thinks I have the ability to play corner and just help out the room. I’m gonna put the team first every time.”
Chandler doesn’t know what his future will hold positionally and will re-evaluate his future at the position when the season ends, and Lea isn’t ruling out the idea that Chandler could be a cornerback long term. Chandler is Vanderbilt’s fifth-highest graded player in coverage this season–only behind CJ Heard, Mason Lewis, Ricardo Jones and Jalen Gilbert. He’s above established corners Martel Hight, Jordan Matthews and Cayden Daniels as well as Vanderbilt’s two transfer cornerbacks.
Through the first stretch of his career at cornerback, Chandler hasn’t recorded an interception but has two passes defended and 22 tackles. He’s played his way into becoming a player that Vanderbilt appears to want to re-invest in and keep around long term. Vanderbilt believes it has a core of young corners in Chandler, Lewis and Daniels that it can build on moving forward.
Chandler was a basketball player–more specifically, a point guard–by trade, but started playing football as a junior in high school when current Vanderbilt receiver Brycen Coleman–whose dad coached both of them in high school–convinced him to. Chandler committed to Virginia, but looks back and says “it wasn’t working” there and that the door was open for Vanderbilt because of its coaching staff. Chandler believes he could’ve been a Division-I basketball player, but now he’s got no room to look back and wonder what could be different if he hadn’t met Coleman.
Lea believes that for a defender to play cornerback, he has to possess a certain attitude. He believes Chandler has it. While Chandler stands off to the side of Vanderbilt’s indoor practice field on this Thursday afternoon, that manifests in him declaring that he expected to play early all along. He may not have expected it to be at corner, but his positional change may have been a defining move in his career.
He’s not ruling that out, at least.
“I'm enjoying corner right now,” Chandler said. “Just being out there with the guys, having fun. That whole room, it’s just nice playing with them guys and right now, I'm making plays. So, I'm not disowning it. So, we’ll just going to see how it goes, wherever they want to do with me.”
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Joey Dwyer is the lead writer on Vanderbilt Commodores On SI. He found his first love in college sports at nearby Lipscomb University and decided to make a career of telling its best stories. He got his start doing a Notre Dame basketball podcast from his basement as a 14-year-old during COVID and has since aimed to make that 14-year-old proud. Dwyer has covered Vanderbilt sports for three years and previously worked for 247 Sports and Rivals. He contributes to Seth Davis' Hoops HQ, Basket Under Review and Mainstreet Nashville.
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