Vanderbilt Football Stock Exchange After Week 5 Loss to Georgia – Sports Illustrated

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For the second week in a row, it was not the result that Vanderbilt football wanted when it left the stadium. The Commodores went on the road and lost to No. 2 Georgia 38-14.
Vanderbilt gave the Bulldogs a good fight in the first half, only trailing by seven points going into the locker room. Ultimately, though, Georgia ran away with the game in the second half, shutting out Vanderbilt 17-0. With the loss, Vanderbilt dropped to 3-2 on the season and 0-2 in SEC play.
There were some Vanderbilt players that did well in the game and others that need to improve as the season hits the halfway point. Here is this week’s Vanderbilt football stock exchange.
Give Vanderbilt backup quarterback Blaze Berlowitz all the credit he deserves. When five-star freshman Jared Curtis was officially announced as out for the game against Georgia, it would have been reasonable to think the game would get out of hand quick and early. It did not, however.
Berlowitz did not make the big mistake. He took good care of the ball up until his interception in the later stages of the second half. He managed the game about as well as one could have hoped for when Vanderbilt had the ball. Berlowitz had Vanderbilt in the middle of a fight at halftime down only 21-14.
His touchdown pass to Junior Sherrill was well-placed even though Sherrill had plenty of separation down the sideline. Berlowitz threw for 190 yards on 12-for-23 passing with his touchdown and an interception. On the ground, Berlowitz had a couple nice scrambles and led the Commodores in rushing yards with 37 yards on eight carries.
Sure, Berlowitz was not a game breaker and he did not have a career day. But it was certainly encouraging to see how Berlowitz kept Vanderbilt in the game until later in the third quarter.
Who knows if Berlowitz will get another start the rest of the season at quarterback. If Curtis returns next week, that will not likely happen this season. But Berlowitz maybe has some kind of a role at wide receiver.
Regardless of what his role will be the last seven games, Berlowitz wants to be on the field and contribute however he can.
It was not the flashiest day from wide receiver Ja’Cory Thomas. He had two catches for 43 yards, which was the best game he has had yardage-wise in a Vanderbilt uniform.
But in all the games that Vanderbilt has played this season, Saturday was the one where Thomas was most active. He nearly had a third catch down the sideline for a big gain, but it was called back due to pass interference. 
Vanderbilt head coach Clark Lea told the media postgame that he cou;d feel Thomas’ activity in the game. He knew it was the best game that Thomas has played this season. He also seemed to want to make sure going forward that Thomas has a similar type of involvement. A reason for that is because Vanderbilt needs a No. 2 wide receiver. The Commodores need a player outside of Junior Sherrill that can pose a credible threat to opponents on a consistent level.
The day that Thomas had Saturday was encouraging, which is why his stock is up. Let’s see if he can keep it going next week against Ole Miss.
For all the concerns about how Vanderbilt would protect whichever quarterback it put on the field, the Vanderbilt offensive line did a satisfactory job overall against the Georgia defensive line.
The Commodores were able to get a push against Georgia in the first half, even finishing with more yards than the Bulldogs in the first half despite trailing by a touchdown. Berlowitz was protected well in the pass game in the first half.
In the second half, Vanderbilt only had 16 plays on offense. That’s partly because Georgia went on long scoring drives, but also due to the lack of offensive execution. But overall, the Vanderbilt offensive front made some progress today and for that, there is reason to be encouraged going into next week.
It was a tough day for Vanderbilt’s punter Saturday. Tyler Ebel went out to punt four times in the game against Georgia and had 157 total punt yards. His longest punt went 61 yards and still had a punt average of just 39.3 yards.
Factor out the 61-yard and Ebel’s punt average would be 32 yards per punt. That is not the idea number special teams coordinator Jeff LePak would want to see out of Ebel.
Last week, Vanderbilt’s special teams had some costly miscues. This week, it did not have as many. Brock Taylor did have a 58-yard field goal attempt blocked in addition to the punt struggles from Ebel. It was not all that detrimental in the grand scheme of the game Saturday, but it is something to monitor going forward.
Vanderbilt wide receiver Cole Adams was nowhere to be found Saturday. Adams had no catches and no targets in the loss to Georgia.
Adams was a guy that the Commodores got in the transfer portal from Alabama, hoping he would help the receiver room in addition to contributions on special teams. But that has not been the case. Adams has caught three total passes on the season for 32 yards. Those three receptions came between the NC State and Auburn games, meaning that is now the third game this season that Adams has not recorded a catch.
In a world where Vanderbilt football needs more production from everyone outside Sherrill in its receiver room, Adams has to do much more going forward.
There are a couple ways that Vanderbilt’s pass defense lowered its stock this weekend.
Firstly, Georgia quarterback Gunner Stockton had by far his best game of the season. Stockton went 25-for-32 passing for 295 yards, three passing touchdowns and no interceptions. It was basically a perfect game that Vanderbilt’s defense allowed Stockton to play. Some of the yardage was Georgia’s receiver just outplaying Vanderbilt on 50/50 passes, but it was more so the coverage Vanderbilt was playing.
It felt like Georgia was able to spread its receivers out wide and do whatever they wanted to against the Vanderbilt secondary.
Another number to illustrate the struggles on pass defense are the numbers from Vanderbilt’s corners and safeties. Cayden Daniels led all cornerbacks with four tackles, followed by Martel Hight with three and Jordan Matthews with two. Those numbers have to be higher if Vanderbilt wants to stay in games against a top tier opponent.
Vanderbilt is going to see plenty more talented quarterbacks in its remaining seven games, including next week’s game against Trinidad Chambliss and Ole Miss. The pass defense has a huge chance to redeem itself next week, but the flip side of that is Vanderbilt’s pass defense could continue to get exposed.
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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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