Why Vanderbilt Football Isn't Treating Alabama Differently Than Anyone Else

NASHVILLE—The word compete doesn’t appear to register all that much for this Vanderbilt team as it prepares for the trip down to Bryant Denny Stadium for a matchup with No. 10 Alabama–which it hasn’t beaten in Tuscaloosa since 1984.

That’s always been the case for this program, but not like this. Competing hasn’t been in the equation all that much for Clark Lea’s program as it’s gone down to Tuscaloosa, it certainly wasn’t as it lost 55-3 the last time it went there. Four years later, it feels as if it doesn’t have to be defined by the results that used to feel inevitable for it.

It also doesn’t feel as if it’s got to be defined by the bar that it used to strive for.

“The word’s not even compete,” Vanderbilt linebacker Langston Patterson–who was on Vanderbilt’s 2022 team that was blown out in Tuscaloosa–said. “If you’re a competitor and you play sports, you’re going down there to dominate. You’re going out there to give it your all no matter what. When I get back on the bus, I don’t want to be able to feel my shoulder, feel my neck. I don’t want to be able to walk the next morning.”

Domination is the furthest thing from what Vanderbilt could’ve confidently expected to do in past iterations of this matchup. When it has, it’s seen it all blow up in its face. Except for what happened this time last season as now-former Vanderbilt safety CJ Taylor predicted a win over No. 1 Alabama and later delivered on his promise.

Diego Pavia — Oct 5, 2024; Nashville, Tennessee, USA; Vanderbilt Commodores running back AJ Newberry (23) gestures a first down against the Alabama Crimson Tide during the second half at FirstBank Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Steve Roberts-Imagn Images | Steve Roberts-Imagn Images

Lea would likely take exemption to his players guaranteeing a win nowadays, but Taylor’s confidence appears to say something about the chip on the shoulder mentality that Vanderbilt’s head coach has hoped to instill within his historically unsuccessful program. No Vanderbilt player has gone as far in terms of their public messaging as Taylor did this time last year, but the spirit of his message appears to be echoing throughout Vanderbilt’s locker room.

“I think this season has been about finding the confidence to dominate, to have a dominant mindset,” Lea said. “That’s a tangible shift.”

Vanderbilt’s players say it never needed last season’s result in order to have confidence, a chip on its shoulder, though. Lea’s players believe they can win every week, this week doesn’t appear to be any different.

They certainly don’t feel as if they need to reference it in order to believe that they can generate a similar result this weekend on ABC, in a game that will put them on College Gameday.

“I don’t think it’s any different than any other game we play on our schedule,” Vanderbilt safety Marlen Sewell said on Saturday. “We don’t vary opponents based on what we did in the past, what they have this year. We’re gonna come in and have a fresh mindset. No matter who it is, we plan to dominate each and every game.”

Patterson didn’t indicate that there’s been a Steven Hubbard-like speech about not speaking in regard to him about anything other than beating Alabama this season, but he says it’s the “same way” around the program in terms of its mindset. It didn’t look ahead to Alabama and it’s not looking ahead to LSU.

It’s also made an effort to make sure that it’s not playing this thing up more than it should be. Who knows how the intensity changes for this Vanderbilt team on Saturday relative to what it’s been thus far, but it insists that Saturday is no different than what it’s already done to this point.

College Gameday being on site is a “dream” for Patterson and the rest of Vanderbilt’s roster alike, but it says that its goals aren’t yet completed.

“Our plan is to go 1-0 this week,” Vanderbilt center Jordan White said as if the premise that anything else mattered was completely outlandish. “That’s our plan and we’re gonna stick to that.”