Vanderbilt Commodores Drop in Power Rankings After Heart Breaker
It was a hard-fought contest that came down to the final 30 seconds for the Vanderbilt Commodores, but it all ended with the Texas Longhorns recovering the last-ditch onside kick attempt.
It was another hour of the Commodores giving a highly-ranked Southeastern Conference opponent everything that they could ask for, but this time the team could not pull it off like they did in their victory over the Alabama Crimson Tide.
When the clock struck 00:00 Saturday, the Longhorns held the lead, and Vanderbilt added another tally to the loss column, marking a 5-3 season so far, with a 2-2 record in conference play.
The loss also saw Vandy drop in the latest college football power rankings from The Athletic, falling to 24th after being ranked 22nd by Chris Vannini in last week's rankings.
It is still a position that no one expected this team to be in at the beginning of the season, strictly due to the long track record of futility that the Commodores have shown on the football field throughout their existence, holding a 618-665-50 record all-time entering the year.
Vanderbilt is a baseball school, everyone knows that; there are a plethora of current Major League Baseball stars that call Vandy their alma mater.
But has fourth-year head coach Clark Lea begun to turn the football program around after a 9-27 start to his tenure?
Or, is this season just the product of a weak early-season schedule and catching opponents like the Crimson Tide at the right time to shock them and the world?
It will be hard to tell by just this season alone, as the remaining schedule for the Commodores is evenly split between what should be easy matchups (on paper) and what should be hard matchups (on paper).
By the end of this year, Vanderbilt should be bowl eligible for the first time since 2018, and only the sixth time this century.
While it is exciting to watch a winning product on the football field, expectations moving forward should be tempered, as everyone knows what can happen when Vandy starts to win football games, just look at the three-year James Franklin era from the early 2010s.
Regardless of what happens in the future, fans and players alike should enjoy the victories that are earned throughout the rest of this season.
While this loss may have dropped the Commodores in the college football power rankings, there are still games left to play and still time to rise back up that list of teams.
