As a tough loss to Florida sinks in, a lot of people in and around the Vanderbilt program will wonder if the scuffle just before halftime fired up the Gators and, in the process, changed the tone and trajectory of this past Saturday’s game in Nashville. People throughout the SEC are wondering the same thing.
By Matt Zemek
While it seems hard to ignore that the Gators looked like a different team in the second half, and while Florida — a team which defeated Georgia-slaying LSU — does have better players than Vanderbilt, the following point needs to be made: Part of the process of becoming a good team involves winning without additional sources of help, sometimes in the face of bad breaks.
Look for a moment at a program outside the SEC: The Miami Hurricanes got so many turnovers and fortuitous bounces last season. To the Canes’ credit, they regularly pounced on those breaks and made the most of them. As a result, they won their first ACC Coastal Division championship and made their first appearance in the ACC Championship Game after 12 misses from 2005 through 2016. The 2017 season was a fun one for Miami, and The U deserved what it got.
However, that abundance of takeaways — which enabled Miami to pull through in so many tough situations — was not likely to replicate itself this season. A familiar word of sports wisdom needed to be heeded by the Hurricanes: “You will need to be better this year to remain in the same place as last year.” Miami needed to be objectively superior to 2017 in various categories and measurements of output just to replicate what it achieved last season. Miami could not count on the same degree of outside help it received in 2017. It had to increase its margins for error and not leave as many situations to chance.
You can see what has happened to Miami this season.
The Canes have not only failed to improve; they haven’t even remained the same. They have regressed, and now they seem likely to lose at least four games and play in a third-tier December bowl Al Golden-coached teams used to play in. Miami could not stand on its own when opponents stopped making copious quantities of mistakes. The Hurricanes would be in even worse shape had Florida State not imploded late in Week 6.
Vanderbilt needs to grasp, internalize and apply this lesson as it moves from the Florida loss and gets ready to play Kentucky.
The Commodores received all sorts of gifts from Florida this past Saturday, en route to a 21-3 lead late in the second quarter. Feleipe Franks threw his almost automatic One Big Interception (in capital letters). The Gators booted the ball around the yard and gave Vanderbilt a short field. Florida blew assignments on defense. It lacked any semblance of focus, and Vanderbilt took advantage.
The table had been set. Up by 18 points against a wayward opponent — and winning battles at the line of scrimmage which had been lost against South Carolina and Georgia — Vanderbilt could not have asked for a better situation.
Then came the scuffle.
Okay, so Florida bounced back. Vanderbilt still had scoreboard leverage and had shortened the game to a 30-minute fight instead of a 60-minute battle. No one was expecting a dynamic second half from Vanderbilt — everyone in the ballyard felt Florida would make a push at the Dores. However, a modest degree of production still could have seen this project through to the finish.
One second-half touchdown would have mattered. One late defensive stop before Florida’s last field goal would have given Kyle Shurmur a final chance to create overtime. One display of focus on a Florida fake punt which easily fooled VU’s special teams unit could have stopped the Gators in their tracks. Florida’s 10-point final margin suggests a degree of comfort for the visitors from Gainesville, but this was an uncomfortable day for a young Florida team which still has a lot to learn. Vanderbilt could have made Florida learn its lesson the hard way, but in a handful of important moments, the Dores weren’t as vigilant as they could be. They weren’t as watchful as they needed to be.
They made progress relative to the previous weeks of their season, but not enough to forge the kind of win which would change the way this season is perceived.
The bad news is that they fell short. The good news is that in the form of Kentucky, they get another chance to pass this test.
The best news: Kentucky’s offense might be worse than Florida’s, enough to give Vanderbilt an opening in Week 8.
It was one of the most stunning single-game developments of the whole 2018 season: In Week 6 at Texas A&M, Kentucky did not initiate an offensive snap in plus territory in an entire regulation-length football game. The Wildcats scored early on a 54-yard pass play. Their other touchdown was a defensive score to tie the contest late in the fourth quarter. Not until overtime did they snap the ball on the Aggies’ side of the field. The surprise is not that Kentucky itself failed to snap a ball in enemy territory in a 60-minute span. The surprise is that it happened to ANY team. Even the worst teams figure to cobble together 26 yards on a drive after a touchback and start a play from the opponent’s 49, but UK couldn’t do that once in four quarters against A&M. The scouting report on Kentucky’s offense is simple: Stop Benny Snell, stop the offense. Quarterback Terry Wilson — other than that one 54-yard pass against the Aggies — threw for under 60 yards the rest of the game. He cannot stretch the field or do much of anything to make Kentucky’s offense more potent or feared. It all starts with Snell. To the extent that he sets up play action, he makes Wilson more effective. Without that foundation on the ground, Kentucky can’t dare to do much through the air.
Kentucky, like Florida, has a vulnerable offense and a solid defense. Vanderbilt knows it has to create takeaways — as it did in the first half against Florida — and then hit big plays on offense, given the small chances of driving 75 yards in 13 plays and seven minutes against a stout defense. VU found these big plays most commonly in the person of Ke’Shawn Vaughn, who tore off a 43-yard run and produced a 75-yard catch-and-run on Saturday against the Gators. If Vanderbilt can take everything it did against Florida in one half and extend that to the second half — at least playing three complete quarters if four is too much to ask — this team could grab its first SEC win and announce itself as a team ready to compete for a bowl bid in November.
Vanderbilt played a strong half of a game against Florida. Now, against Kentucky and into the second half of this season, VU will try to turn its half-game performance into something much more whole.
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