Vanderbilt Football Knows What It Has to do Defensively to Win Saturday – si.com

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Vanderbilt football may not be starting its 2026 campaign against a mighty team from the SEC or another power conference. But it is starting its season against a team that has a player with the capability to explode.
For all the talk of how Vanderbilt should beat Austin Peay more than convincingly, the Governors have a guy that is hoping to help pull off the upset.
Meet Austin Peay quarterback Chris Parson. In 2025, he threw for over 3,000 yards and had a touchdown-to-interception ratio of 23 to five. He also ran for 743 yards and 14 touchdowns. He was one of the more dynamic quarterbacks in the FCS a season ago and he has already got his 2026 campaign off on the same track he was on a year ago.
In Austin Peay’s Week 0 35-17 win over Gardner-Webb, Parson finished with 308 passing yards and a touchdown and 31 rushing yards and a rushing touchdown on 12 carries. It is no secret that containing Parson will be one of the biggest keys for Vanderbilt to avoid an upset.
“He’s a gamer. I mean, this is a really skilled player. I love the way he handles himself in the pocket. I love the confidence with which he’ll step up and deliver a ball,” Lea said of his first impressions of Parson.
Parson may just be a little under 6-foot as a quarterback, but Lea sees the physical strength that Parson has. If he escapes from the pocket, Vanderbilt knows that tackling Parson will not be easy. In fact, Lea compares it to tackling a running back whenever Parson gets out of the pocket to run.
Vanderbilt’s defense is going to have to contain Parson and put a spy on him to prevent explosive or flukey plays. If that fails, Parson has the potential to hurt the Commodores. But that is not the only way where Parson can do damage with his legs.
Austin Peay typically likes to run split box runs where a quarterback has the option to hand it off to a teammate on a jet sweep or the quarterback can keep the ball himself if he finds a hole to run through.
And that does not even begin to detail how Parson can do damage with his arm in the pocket. But of course, how the defense contains him will be of the utmost importance.
“We’re scheming it up, making sure that we contain him and keep him in the pocket when he does break. Vicing him on the perimeter when he does take off. So yeah, it’s definitely been a staple in our defense this week,” Vanderbilt linebacker Nick Rinaldi said. “We’re excited and ready to play a good quarterback.”
Parson would love to be the guy to spoil the party for Vanderbilt this weekend. Parson played at Ravenwood High School in Brentwood, Tennessee. Coming back to the Nashville area trying to pull off an upset is something that Parson would love nothing more to do.
“He’s really skilled, but he’s fun to watch play. He’s fun to watch, he’s not fun to defend,” Lea said. “Respect him as a competitor and have fun competing against him on Saturday. But that’s because of the respect I have for him. Obviously, he’s going to be really excited to be out there, so it’ll be a good challenge for us. But that’s what you want.”
Vanderbilt’s mission to avoid what would be a stunning upset against a shifty quarterback begins Saturday night, when the Commodores kick the season off at 6 p.m. CT.
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Graham Baakko is a writer for Vanderbilt Commodores On SI, primarily covering football, basketball and baseball. Graham is a recent graduate from the University of Alabama, where he wrote for The Crimson White, WVUA-FM, WVUA 23 as he covered a variety of Crimson Tide sports. He also covered South Carolina athletics as a sportswriting intern for GamecockCentral.
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