CFB Multiverse: Arrax vs. Vhagar Revised
What if Arrax had taken out Vhagar? Vandy showed us with their 40-35 win over Alabama.
College football has a way of ruining plans and dreams in spectacular fashion. Alabama’s 41-34 victory over Georgia hit the CFB ecosystem like an earthquake and confirmed everyone’s worst fear: even without Saban the Crimson Tide are still who they are.
And most folks spent the days heading into the Week 6 lineup of Saturday games coming to terms with that reality. But oh did the sport’s fates deliver in a way that I can confidently say no one called or expected.
Vanderbilt did the unthinkable and beat Alabama in a decisive, not fluky, 40-35 game that will be talked and written about until the end of days. That’s probably an exaggeration but this game will get brought up for several years down the line. Regardless how much the Crimson Tide fans and SEC in general wish it to not be the case. I am curious to see which one of those groups is taking it the hardest.
I haven’t called much right this college football season. I predicted chaos and uncertainty but you can’t really take credit when either of those things become reality. And Notre Dame football is decidedly week-to-week this season so write that off as another area I’m losing in. And even the prediction that this article is based on was an object failure. But it’s still so relevant that I’m going to revisit it.
Setting the Stage
Before the 2024 season got kicked off, I drafted all of the Big Ten and SEC teams to dragons from House of the Dragon. The show ended its third series on a very underwhelming note and I needed to salvage something from it.
In that initial piece I assigned the Alabama squad to the Vhagar/Aemond dragon pairing. And Vanderbilt found its spirit pairing with Arrax/Lucerys. It was wholly appropriate at the time. Vandy was coming off a 2-10 campaign in 2023 and they were 18-63 against the Tide dating back to 1903. I honestly didn’t even know they played Alabama this season but it still made so much sense.
Who would’ve thought those folks up in Nashville would present us with a Multiverse scenario in which Arrax and Lucerys ended up not only surviving the Vhagar altercation but also stopping Aemond before he had a chance to reach peak supervillain. What’s to come after this legendary college football upset remains to be seen but why not take the opportunity for some crossover “content”?
Journey to the Battle
Alabama (Vhagar) went into Nashville 4-0 through Week 4 of play. They had size-able wins against Western Kentucky, USF and Wisconsin (assigned to Sunfyre/Aegon) in the original article. Although Wisconsin isn’t doing terribly, the jury is still out on if they will exceed the expectations of their dragon pairing. The Crimson tide’s win margins significantly fell off against Georgia (Vermithor/Hugh). But hey, that pairing is still pretty spot on and Alabama played excellently against the Bulldogs.
Vanderbilt entered Week 6 with a 2-2 overall record. They won their 1st two games of the season but followed up with two losses to Georgia State and Missouri (Syrax/Rhaenera). Although Mizzou kind of fell of in their 41-10 loss to Texas A&M, they were also undefeated before the Week 6 loss. Similar to the Syrax/Matriarch of the Blacks duo, we’ve yet to see how they’ll really fair against stiffer competition.
The Crimson Tide had seen more formidable challenges going into the matchup but Vandy was also heading in looking to turn things around on what had been a promising start. A very similar scenario as the source material.
Offensive Summary
Vanderbilt outperformed Alabama 418-394 in terms of total offense. This was above their 354 yards per game benchmark through Week 5 and Alabama was below their average of 487 yards. Both teams outperformed their benchmarks on the passing side of things. But from this quant perspective, Vandy’s rushing attack was the big differentiator.
Passing Details
Alabama made 24 passing attempts and Vanderbilt made 21. It was slightly, and also comparably, below average for both squads. The teams were also almost identical in terms of passing accuracy. Jalen Milroe was 75% accurate on his attempts and Diego Pavia was 80% accurate. The team-wide 76% accounts for a 0/1 stat from Nate Johnson, Vanderbilt’s backup QB.
Rushing Details
Vandy put up a whopping 54 rushing carries against Alabama. Their average per game going into the matchup was 39. The Crimson Tide recorded 21 rushing carries, well below their average of 38 in the season’s 1st four games. Alabama had the edge I terms of efficiency, with 4 yards per carry compared to Vandy’s 3.1 yards per carry. But Vanderbilt’s strategy did what it needed to do and the Commodore’s had 42:08 minutes of possession time while the Crimson Tide’s offense only had the ball for 17:52 minutes.
Here are the Third Down Situation details for extra context:
Drive Summary
When you break down the drives, you also see how turnovers were just an additional factor that doomed Alabama. An interception returned for a Vandy touchdown during their opening drive and a late fumble would’ve been hard to bounce back from for any team. Not to take away from Vandy in any way, though. They found points through the air, on the ground and knocked two field goals.
Final Thoughts
It’s not just the outcome that’s shocked the world. It’s how Vanderbilt beat Alabama that has a lot of folks understanding what happened but still not being able to piece together the How. No one banks on this kind of game and I contend that it would be the dumbest wager in the world to bet on something similar happening again for a long time.
But the 2024 CFB season is off the rails and has somehow sprouted wings andtaken flight. When I wrote that first dragon article, most of us thought this season would be dominated by the Blacks-Greens showdown of the Big Ten-SEC. Six weeks in, though, and it’s looking more similar to the OG Game of Thrones. Lady Mormont has just taken down the giant and we’re only on Episode 3/Week 7.