NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Vanderbilt football suffered a 21-6 loss to No. 7/7 Alabama on Saturday at FirstBank Stadium.
Vanderbilt (4-6, 1-6 SEC) held Alabama (8-2, 6-2 SEC) scoreless throughout the first 29:54 of the first half, the longest the Crimson Tide have gone before scoring in a game this season.
It was another multi-score perfomance from Brock Taylor, who accounted for all six Commodore points. The Dores took an early lead after a 52-yard kick from Taylor in the first quarter. The field goal conversion made him the program's all-time leading scorer at 256 career points, passing Bryant Hahnfeldt for the No. 1 spot.
Taylor followed with a 57-yard field goal in the third quarter, tying his own record for the longest kick in school history. He is just the third FBS kicker since at least 1996 to drill multiple field goals of 50 yards or more in back-to-back games.
Jared Curtis' 223-yard performance was his sixth game with at least 200 passing yards, the most by a Commodore in their debut season in program history. Junior Sherrill secured seven catches for 100 yards. His reception streak now moves to 47 straight games, the longest in FBS.
Alabama's Keelon Russell threw for three touchdowns, going 22-for-33 while totaling 217 passing yards. Ryan Coleman-Williams was the prime target for Russell throughout the contest, hauling in seven catches for 68 yards; he accounted for 85 all-purpose yards.
Trailing 3-0 for much of the first half, the Crimson Tide used a 21-3 run across the second and third quarters to take control of the game. Each of Alabama's scores came through the air. Daniel Hill led all rushers with 89 yards on 14 carries.
Vanderbilt was just the fourth team this season to force multiple Alabama turnovers. Bryan Longwell led the Commodore defense with 13 total tackles, including a season-high 2.0 tackles for loss. It was Longwell's 47th straight game with a tackle, continuing the second-longest tackling streak in program history. Only two players in all of FBS have a longer stretch.
Vanderbilt travels to Gainesville for its final road matchup of the season, a Nov. 21 meeting with Florida (5-4, 3-4 SEC), at 11 a.m.