Vanderbilt can claim football superiority over the state of Alabama.
The Commodores moved to 6-3 with a 17-7 win over Auburn on Saturday. It is the first time since 1955 that Vanderbilt has defeated both Auburn and Alabama in the same season. Earlier this year, Vanderbilt knocked off then-No. 1 Alabama 40-35 the week after the Crimson Tide defeated Georgia.
Saturday’s game was tied 7-7 at halftime before Vanderbilt made a field goal to take a 10-7 lead late in the third quarter. The Commodores extended the lead to two scores with 4:18 remaining when Eli Stowers caught a four-yard TD pass from Diego Pavia.
It is the second win in a row for Pavia in Auburn. A season ago, Pavia was the quarterback at New Mexico State when the Aggies blew out the Tigers 31-10 in the penultimate week of the regular season.
Vanderbilt’s victory over Alabama was the school’s first over the Crimson Tide since a 30-21 win in 1984. Saturday’s win over Auburn, a team that is now 1-5 in the SEC, is its first since 2012 , when Vanderbilt won 17-13. That was Vanderbilt’s second straight win over the Tigers; a win in 2007 had snapped a 13-game win streak dating back to Vanderbilt’s 1955 victory.
In the years since those double wins in 1955 – Vanderbilt defeated Alabama 21-6 that season and defeated Auburn 25-13, the Commodores had played both the Tigers and Crimson Tide 12 different times in the same season. And in those 24 games, Vanderbilt went just 2-22.
The Commodores’ sixth win of the season means they’ll be heading to a bowl game for the first time since 2018. One more win guarantees Vanderbilt’s first winning season since 2013, when the team went 9-4 in James Franklin’s final year in the league. Nashville.
