Exclusive: How Vanderbilt Football Looks to Fill a Hole at Tight End

It could not be more clear what one of the most pressing questions of the offseason for Vanderbilt football is. How do the Commodores replace All-SEC tight end and now NFL tight end Eli Stowers?

It is one of the two biggest holes next to the quarterback position that Vanderbilt had to figure out how to fill, next to what the program does at the quarterback position. The Commodores already have Cole Spence, who is reasonably set up to have a season that involves plenty more pass catching opportunities. Vanderbilt also brought in Jayvontay Conner from East Carolina, Walter Taylor from Ball State for his second stint in Nashville and Maurice Veney from Morehouse College.

With that type of turnover in the position room comes the new guys having to build chemistry and learn the new system. Naturally, that causes growing pains to happen and Vanderbilt tight end coach Brendan Flaherty has experienced some of those so far.

“The system and the communication, whether that be being on the same page with the offensive line, whether it be communicating pressures, combos, different things of that nature, communicating to each other, you know so there were growing pains that way,” Flaherty told Vandy On SI.

In the passing game as well, there has been a learning curve with the tight ends communicating on routes and reads of the defense, but that is all a part of learning a new system. Flaherty has seen his new guys go through the mistakes, but more importantly, he has seen them grow from them, which only encourages him and the coaching staff.

Vanderbilt’s tight ends have big shoes to fill with Stowers’ departure to the NFL. It is not a situation where the coaching staff is expecting anyone to evolve into another version of Stowers. Vanderbilt’s coaches seem to know that expecting Spence or any of the tight ends to match or surpass the play of the 2025 John Mackey Award winner would be unrealistic.

Instead, the approach that Vanderbilt is going to take in 2026 is more of a holistic one. The Commodores are going to use the individual skills of each tight end to collectively fill in the gap that Stowers left in the pass and run game.

“Moving forward this year, just with the balance of talent and skill sets that we have, the plan is for Cole to still kind of be the leader in the run game, but take an expanded role in the pass game. JC [Jayvontay Conner] and Walt they’re kind of right now the main rep getters at that H spot, and they're both going to be able to do a little bit more run game stuff, just kind of body type wise, compared to what we asked Eli to do,” Flaherty said. “Mo [Veney] missed most of spring, but it’s starting to start to click for him. He’s gonna be a guy who should be very, very good in the run game with his background and what he's been, but also should be able to be a little bit more of a pass threat.”

It is a lot easier said than done for Vanderbilt’s tight ends to continue the type of production Stowers brought to the offense, but it is not impossible. Flaherty’s evaluation of where the tight ends are at right now seems to be in a good place.

The split between running and passing depending on which tight end is in the game may look a little bit different this year. The Commodores had a passing tendency of 72% when Stowers was in the game and a 83% run tendency when he was not, per the program’s analytics Flaherty told Vandy On SI.

Mistakes will happen with the new faces, but the program still has Spence to help lead the room. What Flaherty sees for certain is his position room making progress months before the season begins.

“They’ve all worked hard and evolved. It’s been fun to see,” Flaherty told Vandy On SI.

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