Vanderbilt's top plays of the season — adjusted for the Music City Bowl

Before Vanderbilt's Music City Bowl victory, we gave you the Commodores' top 12 plays of the season on offense, defense and special teams. Well, time to do some updating.

We've added six plays from the Boston College game:
• Offense (2): Larry Smith's pass to George Smith that set up the game-winning field goal.
• Offense (8): Larry Smith's 51-yard bomb to Sean Walker in the first quarter.
• Defense (3): Myron Lewis' interception to end the game.
• Special teams (1): Brett Upson's amazing coffin corner punt that bounced off an Eagle returner's leg and was recovered in the end zone by true freshman Sean Richardson (see photo above).
• Special teams (2): Bryant Hahnfeldt's game-winning field goal.
• Special teams (5): Brett Upson's 43-yard punt late in the third quarter that was downed on the BC 3 yard line.

With these six plays replacing other plays, the Auburn game still holds the most big plays for the Commodores with eight, followed by six big plays apiece in the Boston College, South Carolina and Ole Miss games. The Kentucky game had five big plays, Rice four and Miami (Ohio) one.

Anyway, here are the updated rankings:

OFFENSIVE PLAYS

1. BARDEN’S CATCH (AUBURN 10/4)
2. NEW! SMITH TO SMITH SETS UP WINNING FG (BOSTON COLLEGE 12/31)
3. TD TO D.J. PART 1 (AT KENTUCKY 11/15)
4. NICKSON GOES LONG (SOUTH CAROLINA 9/4)
5. MACK TO WHEELER FOR SIX (AUBURN 10/4)
6. TD TO D.J. PART 2 (AT KENTUCKY 11/15)
7. HAWKINS STEPS UP (SOUTH CAROLINA 9/4)
8. NEW! SMITH GOES DEEP TO WALKER (BOSTON COLLEGE 12/31)
9. HAWKINS...COULD...GO... (AT OLE MISS 9/20)
10. GRAHAM GRABS LEAD (RICE 9/13)
11. NICKSON GETS ROLLING (AT KENTUCKY 11/15)
12. MACK KEEPS DRIVE ALIVE (AUBURN 10/4)

DEFENSIVE PLAYS

1. MARVE’S GOAL LINE STRIP (AT OLE MISS 9/20)
2. HAMILTON GETS DORES ON BOARD (AT OLE MISS 9/20)
3. NEW! MYRON'S PICK ICES GOLDEN EAGLES (BOSTON COLLEGE 12/31)
4. D.J. SEALS THE DEAL (AT KENTUCKY 11/15)
5. HAMILTON LEADS GOAL LINE STAND (AT OLE MISS 9/20)
6. HAMILTON PULLS HAT TRICK (AT OLE MISS 9/20)
7. DORES BUILD BRICK WALL (AUBURN 10/4)
8. SPEAD ROBS SMELLEY (SOUTH CAROLINA 9/4)
9. TRICE SACKS AND STEALS (RICE 9/13)
10. D.J. COOLS OFF CATS (AT KENTUCKY 11/15)
11. MYRON PUTS TIGERS ON ICE (AUBURN 10/4)
12. LANGFORD HALTS DRIVE (SOUTH CAROLINA 9/4)

SPECIAL TEAM PLAYS

1. NEW! THE INCREDIBLE BOUNCING PUNT AND TOUCHDOWN (BOSTON COLLEGE 12/31)
2. NEW! HAHNFELDT NAILS GAME WINNER (BOSTON COLLEGE 12/31)
3. UPSON PUTS GAME OUT OF REACH (AUBURN 10/4)
4. BOUNCE GOES VANDERBILT’S WAY (SOUTH CAROLINA 9/4)
5. NEW! UPSON PINS BACK EAGLES LATE IN THIRD QUARTER (BOSTON COLLEGE 12/31)
6. D.J. RETURN GETS THINGS ROLLING (AUBURN 10/4)
7. STOKES BLOCKS FIELD GOAL (SOUTH CAROLINA 9/4)
8. TIGER MISS TURNS OUT TO BE DIFFERENCE (AUBURN 10/4)
9. D.J. NEEDS 92 YARDS, GETS 91 (MIAMI-OHIO 8/28)
10. UPSON PUNTS, HAMILTON RECOVERS (AT OLE MISS 9/20)
11. UPSON PINS OWLS (RICE 9/13)
12. HAHNFELDT GIVES BREATHING ROOM (RICE 9/13)

Vanderbilt offensive coordinator Ted Cain wants to continue "doing the right things" — huh?

In Wednesday's victory over Boston College, Vanderbilt did the right things on defense and special teams. Obviously, the Commodore offense was another story.

So what does offensive coordinator Ted Cain plan to do next season if he's still aboard, and Bobby Johnson hasn't said anything to lead us to believe otherwise?

He told the Tennessean's Mo Patton: "We'll continue to look at our scheme, both run and pass, and make sure we're doing the right things and asking them to do the right things."

Make sure we're doing the right things? How about: Make sure we start doing the right things!

There's more:

"Our biggest thing is we need to score more points. That's our biggest goal."

Great! Self-awareness is a start. Of course, being ranked among the three worst offenses in college football should get anybody's attention.

"We'll always address those areas like red-zone, short-yardage, but we need to continue to keep the ball, drive the ball and score points."

On Wednesday, his offense did keep the ball. Check.

And it did drive the ball early and when it need to. Check.

But scoring points? Ah, no. When you can't score points, your defense and special teams have to be perfect and get some lucky breaks, too, if you're going to win.

You know how many points our offense scored against Tennessee, Wake Forest and Boston College combined?

Six.

You know how many points our offense scored against Miss State and Duke?

Twelve.

We've got to score points to win, and we've got to be able to score quick and have big plays on offense.

I'm sure Bobby Johnson realizes this, I hope Ted Cain does too, and I look forward to seeing what they're going to do about it.

For once, D.J. Moore lacks timing — Vanderbilt All-American chooses wrong time to announce he's leaving school for the NFL

Everybody figured that Wednesday's Music City Bowl would be the last game in a Vanderbilt uniform for D.J. Moore, the Commodore's brilliant all-everything player. Everybody also figured that Moore would have to do just about everything for the Commodores to upset Boston College.

As it turned out, Moore rolled his ankle in the second quarter after breaking up a deep ball that Ryan Hamilton grabbed for an interception.

Vanderbilt won the game without D.J. Moore. True freshman Casey Hayward played brilliantly, and nearly grabbed an interception late in the game before Myron Lewis got burned deep. And except for that one surrendered 55-yard TD, Lewis looked like an All-American himself, breaking on the ball and leaping for the game-ending interception.

It was a gutsy victory for the Commodores, and their first bowl victory since 1955. Announcer Bob Davie, who either doesn't prepare for games or has extremely poor short-term memory, thought it was the Commodores' first bowl victory ever. At any rate, it was a big story. So ESPN went down on the field after the game to talk to D.J. Moore.

Was he frustrated to be on the sideline with the game on the line? "I wanted to play," Moore said. "He (Coach Bobby Johnson) didn’t want me to play so it was very frustrating."

Yeah, Coach Johnson didn't want his best player to play. More like, Coach Johnson didn't want to injure a future first-round NFL draft pick. There's no doubt that Bobby Johnson cares about his players; in fact, he had worked with D.J. to give him an honest assessment of his potential and he knew midway through the season that this season would be D.J.'s last.

Down on the field after the game, the ESPN guy asked D.J. about the NFL. "Honestly I done done all I can do in college, I feel," D.J. said. "I wanted to be All-American, I wanted to be All-SEC, so this is my last year in college football."

So ESPN went back to the studio and talked about D.J. and how he'll make a good NFL cover man and return specialist. Mark May said he's got the size and speed and he's very physical and he can cover one-on-one and he's a return man.

"When you go to Vanderbilt," continued May, "they don’t go to bowl games, they don’t win bowl games, so for D.J. Moore to make that decision now is the proper decision because he’s definitely going to be drafted high in the NFL draft.

So D.J. stole the team's thunder. In what was and is a great moment for Vanderbilt, D.J. announces that he's going pro and the producer cuts to the studio so the so-called expert can talk about what a bad program Vanderbilt is and how D.J. should get out the first chance he can because the Commodores will surely return to their losing ways.

I like D.J. By all accounts he's a good kid. And he's a football player, not a public speaker or trained media spokesperson. Of course he didn't mean to take the spotlight from his teammates or cast aspersions on Coach Johnson. The ESPN sideline guy clearly had a tip and was gunning for a scoop and clearly D.J. wanted to tell the world he was going pro.

The timing was bad, that's all. The deadline to declare for the draft is two weeks away, and D.J. had already made his decision months ago. He could have waited another day or two, avoiding these questions like most every other player in this situation does and celebrating with his teammates, and then holding a press conference or releasing a statement later in the week.

During the postgame press conference, somebody asked Johnson about it.

Johnson said D.J. was not coming back to school and was going to start preparing for the NFL. "I want what’s best for him," Johnson said. "I really hope it works out for him. . . How he does in the NFL I really don’t know. He’s a football player."

As for Vanderbilt's future, ESPN's excellent SEC blogger Chris Low had this take after the Music City Bowl:

"The reality is that this has been building for several years at Vanderbilt. Johnson has upgraded the talent. His staff is outstanding, and these guys believe.

"Even with Moore leaving for the NFL, there's a lot of young talent in the program, making the future a bright one.

"And winning a bowl game will only help matters as Johnson and his assistants hit the recruiting trail in January.

"The next step is ramping up the offense, but the Commodores proved Wednesday they know how to win, and more importantly, have the fortitude to fight back from a disappointing finish to the regular season and make history."

Amen, brother.

And thanks, D.J., for helping turn the ship around.

These Music City Bowl plays made the difference for Vanderbilt

Remember Vanderbilt's victories earlier in the season over South Carolina, Ole Miss and Auburn? Each of those games had a bunch of plays that decided the game for the Commodores — take any of those plays away and Vanderbilt loses, maybe even by a couple of touchdowns.

Add the Music City Bowl to these games. Here are 10 huge plays that won it for the Dores:

1. SMITH GOES DEEP TO WALKER (first quarter): On Vanderbilt's second drive of the game, surprise starter Larry Smith fires a 51-yard pass to Sean Walker, showing that the previous scoring drive wasn't a fluke. Though Smith is once again replaced by Nickson and the offense once again breaks down in the red zone, the pass ultimately leads to another Hahnfeldt field goal and a 6-0 lead.

2. WELCH'S GRAB (first quarter): With Vanderbilt winning 6-0 and facing third and one on their own 34 yard line, Smith takes a vicious shot and the ball sails into the air. Right tackle Thomas Welch, a former tight end, snatches the fumble like it's a short pass play. Vanderbilt won't have a turnover all day.

3. NICKSON'S BIG RUN (third quarter): On the Commodores' first drive of the second half, Smith heads to the bench once again in favor of Nickson. The partisan crowd starts to boo the move until Nickson breaks free for a 30-yard run that will constitute about 40 percent of the team's rushing yards for the whole game. Though Vanderbilt can't convert on third down and has to punt, Nickson's run sets up...

4. THE INCREDIBLE BOUNCING PUNT (third quarter): Brett Upson (see above) launches another rolling rugby punt that bounces straight for the return man, grazing his leg and continuing on toward the goal line. While the punt coverage team, unaware of the ball's live status, is waiting to down it on the one yard line, true freshman Sean Richardson knocks the ball into the end zone and falls on it. After some confusion, the referees signals touchdown. It's the miracle touchdown that Vanderbilt needs. After the PAT, Commodores leads 13-7. In the post-game press conference, the Tennessean's Joe Biddle would tell Upson, "Take us through that punt where you aimed it at the BC player's foot. That’s pretty good."

5. ANOTHER UPSON BEAUTY (third quarter): Late in the third quarter, Upson booms a 43-yard punt that pins the Eagles back on their three yard line. In all, he'll place three punts inside the 20 yard line, have a 42.7 yard net average for the game, and be named Most Valuable Player of the Music City Bowl.

6. THE FACE MASK PENALTY (fourth quarter): Suddenly trailing 14-13 late in the fourth quarter and deep in Commodore territory, Larry Smith runs a draw play and a Golden Eagle player grabs his face mask for only the second penalty of the game. Vanderbilt moves up to its own 44.

7. THE ROUGHING THE PASSER PENALTY (fourth quarter): On a crucial third and two, Mackenzi Adams enters the game for what will be his only play of the day. His pass falls incomplete, but BC linebacker Mark Herzlich, the ACC defensive player of the year, hits Adams. A flag flies and the ball moves to the BC 34. Herzlich later says he wasn't trying to hit Adams late. No matter.

8. SMITH TO SMITH (fourth quarter): After another backward running play backs up Vanderbilt to the BC 40, freshman Larry Smith hits fifth-year senior George Smith for a 15-yard pass that puts the ball on the BC 25 and the Commodores into field goal range.

9. HAHNFELDT NAILS IT (fourth quarter): Late in the fourth quarter, Bryant Hahnfeldt, the same guy who missed a couple of short field goals against Duke, nails a 45-yard field goal and gives Vanderbilt a 16-14 lead.

10. LEWIS REDEEMS HIMSELF (fourth quarter): Myron Lewis, the same guy who was burned minutes earlier on a 55-yard up-and-out pass play that gave BC the lead, floats in front of a BC receiver, picks off a Dominique Davis pass and gets his feet in bounds in front of a jubilant Commodore bench. Game over. Lewis also iced the Auburn victory with an interception.

Note: The last five of these plays happened at the end of the game, in a span of five minutes.

Coach Bobby Johnson on Vanderbilt's Music City Bowl victory — and the future

Here are some post-game quotes from the always quotable Coach Johnson:

ON THE KEYS TO VICTORY
• "Field position was huge in this game."
• "No penalties, no turnovers, 16 points on special teams — it’s a good formula if you can make it work."
• "Our fans were fantastic — we could hear them the whole game. I’m sure that helped us and gave us a little bit of an advantage but we’re glad they were there."
• "That was the main emphasis for us — if you win the bowl game you’ll have a winning season. We want to be called winners. We want to be called champions. "
• "We had extra time for special teams (during bowl practices) that we took advantage of."

FROM THE NO KIDDING DEPARTMENT
• On Chris Nickson's passing: "He didn’t do a very good job of that."
• On Vanderbilt's performance on third down (only one first down on 15 tries, including zero-for-five on third and one yard):"We didn’t do a very good job on third down."
• On the weather: "It was cold out there today."
• On how he felt after the win: "I guess everybody can figure out we’re pretty happy. It may not have been the prettiest victory in the whole world but it is now."

LOOKING TO THE FUTURE
• On improving on third and one: "That’s going to be an emphasis in spring practice. It ought to be automatic. We ought to get third and one at least 80-90 percent of the time."
• On next year's team: "We got a bunch of guys coming back who’ve gotten used to winning and liking it."

52,250 Vanderbilt fans helped Commodores win Music City Bowl

I've already given you a bunch of key stats from the game — rushing yards, third down efficiency, net punting average, etc.

But here's another number, and a really big one:

54,250

That's the attendance at LP Field for this year's Music City Bowl. Now consider that Boston College brought about 2,000 fans with them. Now subtract 2,000 from 54,250 and you're left with 52,250 — the number of people rooting for Vanderbilt.

That's about right. I was at the game on Wednesday and I'd say about 4 percent of the crowd was wearing maroon and gold and the rest were wearing black and gold.

It was a special moment, sitting in a big-time stadium that any big-time college football team would be proud to call home, and for one night it was filled with screaming Vanderbilt fans. For one night, LP Field was our house.

"The crowd was fantastic," Bobby Johnson said in the press conference after the game. "I looked around and it was black and gold everywhere. It was cold out there today. For those fans to cheer us on in those elements, it was great."

I was there with my wife and four children and my brother-in-law and his son. It was cold, but it was great. We were in the end zone when Hahnfeldt hit his big kick. Then after the game we were heading out of Nashville on I-40 when we heard Johnson on the radio telling Joe Fisher that the crowd was fantastic. He kept using the word fantastic.

"Hey kids, listen to this," I called back to the two kids on the second row of seats in the minivan and the two kids on the third row of seats in the minivan. "He's talking about you."

And if you were there cheering on the Commodores, he was talking about you too.

Vanderbilt's Music City Bowl victory defies logic — once again

Nobody gave Vanderbilt a chance to beat Boston College in the Music City Bowl. Well, nobody except Vanderbilt.

In fact, the Commodores were fully aware of the ESPN poll that had 90 percent of America predicting the Golden Eagles to roll on New Year's Eve.

Did Coach Bobby Johnson mention the poll to his players during their bowl practices?

"Only every day," Johnson said in the post-game press conference. "I brought up the ESPN poll every day." He added in his tongue-in-cheek way: "We just like to disappoint all those people."

Look at most of the stats alone and you'd conclude that Boston College was indeed victorious. How did the Vanderbilt offensive line handle BC's mammoth defensive front? Um, they didn't. Vanderbilt faced 3rd and 1 five times and was horrendous every time, failing to convert all five times and losing a total of 10 yards in the process. The last two times were in the fourth quarter — first, Vanderbilt could have run down the clock and either scored the winning touchdown or allowed Hahnfeldt to boot the game winner with no time left for the Eages; the last time, Vanderbilt would have run down the clock but instead gave the ball back to BC for yet another shot at winning.

Also, Vanderbilt was outgained 331 yards to 200. Chris Nickson played half the game and was zero for three passing. The offense didn't score a single point. Jared Hawkins wasn't fully healed and the ground game picked up only 79 yards on 36 carries; take away a 30-yard gain by Nickson in the third quarter and that's 49 yards on 35 carries. Oh yeah, and D.J. Moore was injured for the last three quarters of the game.

So how the heck did Vanderbilt win?

The Commodores returned to their early season formula, when they went 5-0:

• Zero turnovers, but three takeaways, including a fumble recovery for a touchdown and two interceptions.
• Zero penalties, while BC had three, including two penalties for 29 yards on Vanderbilt's game-winning drive.
• Ferocious pass defense, forcing Dominique Davis to throw 21 incompletions and two interceptions in 36 passes.
• 16 points on special teams (3 FGs, 1 TD, 1 PAT)
• Brent Upson's nine punts for a net of 42.6 yards, including three downed inside the 20 but not counting the one that was being downed right outside the goal line until true freshman Sean Richardson realized it had touched the BC return man and pushed it into the end zone for the touchdown.
• Bryant Hahnfeldt's perfect performance, including 3-3 FGs and the 45-yard game winner, and 1-1 PATs.
• Just enough offense when it mattered, like some big Larry Smith passes early to set up the two first quarter field goals, then the Nickson run at the start of the third quarter that allowed Upson to launch the punt that careened off the BC return man and rolled into the end zone, then the huge 15-yard pass from Larry Smith to George Smith late in the game to set up Hahnfeldt's winning kick.

What a game and what a great night to be a Commodore.

I'll have more on the big victory today and tomorrow, including:

• Post-game quotes
• Key plays
• Key performances
• And the answer to a question: Is there hope for our offense next season?