Vanderbilt's 40-35 win over No. 1 Alabama on Saturday was one of the biggest upsets in SEC history. Alabama entered the Vanderbilt game riding high off a 41-34 victory over Georgia in Week 5, which vaulted the Tide to the top of the AP Top 25.
The Commodores, meanwhile, were 0-60 against top-five opponents, and 50 of those losses came by double-digits. Their last win over Alabama came in 1984; the Crimson Tide had won the last 23 matchups. Vanderbilt pulled off the upset by controlling the clock and keeping the ball on the ground.
The Commodores rushed for 167 yards as a team, with 120 coming from quarterback Diego Pavia and running back Sedrick Alexander . Pavia finished 16 of 20 for 252 yards through the air and threw two touchdown passes. The upset marks the first time the top-ranked team in the country fell to an unranked foe since Texas A&M defeated .
.. Alabama .
.. 41-38 in 2021.
Here is a peak at every upset loss a No. 1 ranked team (in either the AP poll or Coaches Poll) has suffered to an unranked opponent since 2007. Oct.
5, 2024: Vanderbilt 40, No. 1 Alabama 35 (AP) Less than a week after Kalen DeBoer delivered the biggest win of the post-Nick Saban era over Georgia, his team was on the wrong side of one of the biggest upsets in the history of the storied conference. How did Vanderbilt pull off the upset? They controlled the clock.
The Commodores ran the football 54 times (compared to only 21 pass attempts) and won the time of possession (42:08 to 17:52) in lopsided.