Three Keys And A Prediction: Vanderbilt Football vs. Georgia
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NASHVILLE—Vanderbilt football has its biggest test yet on Saturday, but will it rise to the occasion?
Clark Lea and company travel to Athens on Saturday to face Kirby Smart’s No. 2 Georgia team, which hasn’t lost to Vanderbilt in the Lea era and won the first two games of it by over 100 points combined. Lea and company have come a long way since then, though, and appear to have real belief that they can compete with Smart’s team this time around.
“This is exactly why you sign up for these jobs, why you come to Vanderbilt to play,” Lea said, “For challenges like this, and I've got a team that right now is focused on the details, the execution that we're gonna need for Saturday, but is putting in the work and preparing themselves to go down and fight for the result we want.”
Belief and intensity don’t guarantee anything against a team of this caliber, though. Here’s a few other things Vanderbilt will need to focus on in order to have a chance late against Georgia and a prediction.
Can Jared Curtis get on the field and be effective?
With Curtis, Vanderbilt football always appears to have a chance to be in the fight. But as it heads to the stadium that he once committed to playing in, it may not have him.
Curtis was listed as questionable for Vanderbilt’s Saturday matchup with Georgia on Wednesday’s injury report and it appears as if he’ll stay that way coming out of Vanderbilt’s Thursday practice.
"He's banged up. He's not been able to be full-go in practice. So I think this has been about the injury report is there for a reason and we want to honor that. Questionable is the right marking for him right now. I'm hopeful. I think every day he's felt a little better and he's done a little more in practice," Lea said. "Certainly not ruling him out."
Without Curtis, it’s hard to see any scenario in which Vanderbilt is in this game. Even if he’s in the game, he may be limited athletically.
Vanderbilt has to run the ball effectively
The rainy conditions won’t be advantageous for Vanderbilt on Saturday and will make it difficult to throw downfield with any sort of consistency. As a result, the onus is on Vanderbilt’s running game again.
This time, it has to answer the call.
Vanderbilt only had a competent running game for stretches of the second half Saturday against Auburn, though, and is projected to struggle against Georgia’s stout defensive front. It has to control the time of possession and win on the ground to have a chance, though.
Get the swing plays this time
Vanderbilt has lost on special teams too much and has turned it over too much at times through its first four games, none of that can happen on Saturday.
For Vanderbilt to beat Georgia, it has to win the margins and has to have a few swing plays go its way Saturday. It has to avoid the big turnover and force one itself. It has to have a special teams blunder go its way and avoid its own. It has to swing the game in a flukey way like Auburn did to it.
Easier said than done.
Prediction: Georgia: 38, Vanderbilt: 10
In the famous words of Jerry Stackhouse, this feels like a scheduled loss. Going to Athens to play this Georgia team with an unhealthy quarterback that gave Georgia a chip on its shoulder by flipping his commitment away from it feels like a disaster waiting to happen.
But, Vanderbilt won’t get beat the way it has in previous trips to Athens. It may not be a College Football Playoff contender, but Saturday could be an opportunity for it to show that it’s no longer a bottom feeder.
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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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