Diego Pavia is a Vanderbilt legend who beats Bama, and Vandy is a college football coach
A tinge of sympathy struck in that moment, as I sat in Vanderbilt’s McGugin Center last month listening to Diego Pavia talk about turning down significant money at Nevada to instead play his final collegiate season at Vanderbilt.
“That will come when I go to the NFL,” Pavia said at the time about the money. “That is my dream goal. This was the best opportunity for me, the best way to get there.”
That seemed like such a misunderstanding of his own limitations. Now it sounds like an understatement. Tell me this folk hero who just put 40 at No. 1 in Alabama won’t be a Pro Football Hall of Famer at 30 and an NFL Commissioner at 50.
“Every time he touches the ball, we have a chance!” Clark Lea told SEC Network’s Alyssa Lang in the chaotic moments after Vanderbilt 40 became No. 1 Alabama 35 final, the biggest Vanderbilt football victory in about a century, followed by goalposts parading through the heart of a city that supports Vanderbilt football often forgotten exists.
Give Pavia all NIL – if you’re a restaurant in Nashville that isn’t at least offering its appetizers right now, you should be ashamed of yourself. Don’t put limits on what he can do (the official assessment of his NFL hopes, per The Athletics design expert Dane Brugler said on Saturday that he is not currently considered eligible, but is “certainly doing what he needs to do to get noticed”).
And don’t miss the college football classes he helps teach. He’s a great player and a great story in this sport, and after he’s gone, Lea and Vanderbilt will still get a chance because they’ve embraced the need to be different. Here’s what programs facing an ongoing talent shortage need to do.
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How many coaches wish they had landed Pavia this offseason instead of the less impressive quarterback they brought out of the transfer portal? A few, I think, but Pavia’s toughness, game and sleight of hand are multiplied in the plan that traveled with him from New Mexico State to Vanderbilt.
That offense, Jerry Kill’s baby, coordinated by Tim Beck, shares the lead role with Pavia on the season, which sits at 3-2 with plenty of opportunities ahead. This team could easily be 5-0, ranked in the top 10 and No. 1 in college football, but late defensive failures could send heartbreakers to Georgia State and Missouri.
Pavia made a number of things happen that were all on him, none bigger than faking a handoff on fourth-and-1, blocking a quick pass on his first covered read, scrambling around and throwing a 36-yard touchdown pass to Junior Sherrill. . That made it 30-21 Vanderbilt with 2:53 left in the third quarter, and that’s when you knew Alabama was truly in one.
WHAT. A. PLAY pic.twitter.com/1OURMUFi9o
— Vanderbilt Football (@VandyFootball) October 5, 2024
He also did some things that were purely a function of an offense that pushed the boundaries of creativity. The speed option in a shovel pass – some big ones for Eli Stowers, who will absolutely be drafted – the variety of play-action shots, the counters and powers and pulls.
The NFL has been more fun to watch and change over the past decade because it has borrowed many concepts from some of college football’s best minds. But Pavia and Vanderbilt’s offense illustrates the superiority of the college product.
There are still a lot of things in the college game that people in the NFL wouldn’t think about, and some of it helps create a level of equality that otherwise wouldn’t have any chance of existing. Check out some of the things teams like Navy and UNLV are doing this season. And those teams don’t have to deal with teams like Texas and Alabama.
“If we want to win in this competition,” Kill said, “we have to be different.”
PAVIA TO JOHNSON FOR THE TOUCHDOWN pic.twitter.com/UcS9lN4ndf
— Vanderbilt Football (@VandyFootball) October 5, 2024
To Vanderbilt fans who have been screaming for years that their team can’t hope to compete without schematic uniqueness, congratulations. You were right about that, just as you were wrong all Saturday afternoon that your team would screw up, the only question was the excruciating details.
While the fever dream of actually getting the job done against Alabama was just taking hold among fans, Pavia ripped through one of the wildest postgame interviews ever with Lang, culminating with: “Vandy we’re (freaking) turningt !”
Then Lea got emotional in a more traditional way, talking about his program, his players who have endured years of losing and his athletic director, Candice Lee.
In September, after an upset of Virginia Tech to start the season that now looks pretty mild, Pavia and Vanderbilt were a story. An eyebrow was raised when Pavia started talking about his new head coach.
“Coach Leah? He’s a psychopath just like me,” Pavia said. “Of course. Not many people would know that, but deep down he has that mentality of winning at all costs, doing whatever it takes. He has to act a certain way, but man, me and coach Lea have had deep, deep conversations about things.
Years from now, they might be talking about Pavia’s role, and the offense he runs, in salvaging a coaching stint that went nowhere for three seasons.
Required reading
• Vanderbilt beats No. 1 Bama. Is this the biggest upset in SEC history?
• When was the last time Vanderbilt beat Alabama? More than 40 years ago
• How will Vanderbilt’s upset over Alabama affect the College Football Playoff?
(Photo: Carly Mackler/Getty Images)
