Vanderbilt Football Learns Kickoff Time Against Kentucky – Sports Illustrated

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Vanderbilt football is beginning the second half of its 2026 season this weekend when it takes on Arkansas Saturday night.
It is Vanderbilt’s final home game until mid-November, where the Commodores will host Alabama a little over a month from now. After this weekend, Vanderbilt has its final game before its bye week. It will travel to Lexington to take on the Kentucky Wildcats Oct. 24.
Monday afternoon, the SEC announced game times for all SEC games for the Oct. 24 slate of games. Vanderbilt knew before the season started it would be playing Kentucky in a night game, but now it knows what time kickoff will be. Per a media release from the conference, the Commodores will kick off against the Wildcats at 6:30 p.m. CT on SEC Network.
It will be the second consecutive night game that Vanderbilt will be playing in. This week’s matchup against Arkansas is a 6 p.m. CT kickoff in Nashville. Last season, Vanderbilt took on Kentucky under the light of FirstBank Stadium for its final home game of the 2025 season and beat the Wildcats 45-17 in convincing fashion.
Vanderbilt is looking for its third consecutive win over Kentucky in the head-to-head series. The Commodores have not lost to the Wildcats since the 2023 season, before Diego Pavia arrived at Vanderbilt.
Before it travels to Kentucky, Vanderbilt has what has actually turned into a big game against Arkansas. The Commodores have been reeling as of late, losing three in a row after a 3-0 start to the 2026 season. Looking down the rest of the schedule, this is by far the easiest game Vanderbilt has remaining. Vanderbilt and Arkansas are the only two teams in the SEC without a conference win this year.
Vanderbilt’s matchup against Arkansas is a big game from the standpoint of wanting and needing its season to stay on the tracks. A loss this weekend would make achieving bowl eligibility a tall task before the road game against Kentucky.
The other two remaining home games Vanderbilt has after this weekend are against Alabama Nov. 14 and in-state rival Tennessee Nov. 28. In addition to the road trip against Kentucky next week, Vanderbilt travels to Mississippi State Nov. 7 and Florida Nov. 21.
At 3-3, Vanderbilt has work to do. It will have to either equal that record or better if it wants to make a bowl game. The question is how Vanderbilt will respond to its three-game losing streak.
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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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