Vanderbilt upset No. 1 Alabama, 40–35, on Saturday. As could be — or should be — expected, fans at FirstBank Stadium in Nashville went crazy to celebrate the Commodores’ first-ever win over a top-five team.
Not only did the crowd storm the field, but the goal posts came down.
Once they came down, the goal posts were on their way out of the stadium, carried by the jubilant Commodores faithful.
Did those fans carry the goal posts all the way to Broadway in downtown Nashville two miles away? Yes, they did. Adrenaline can do wonders for a pumped-up fan base after beating one of college football’s perennial powers.
Those fans may also have been fueled by a quote from former Alabama coach Nick Saban, dismissing Vanderbilt as a tough place for SEC football teams to play.
“The only place that’s not hard to play in the SEC is Vanderbilt,” Saban said recently on The Pat McAfee Show.
Will the goal posts make their way into the Cumberland River like the posts that went into the Tennessee River after the Volunteers upset Alabama in 2022?
Anything is possible.
Imagine being in downtown Nashville on a Saturday night and possibly seeing a crowd of football fans carrying goal posts down the street.
The bachelorette parties are gonna be so confused when the goal posts make it to Broadway
— Christopher Oven (@Chris_Oven) October 6, 2024
Eventually, the celebration was accompanied by a police escort.
On social media, fans wondered if Vanderbilt fans have ever had a reason to tear down the goal posts at their home stadium.
Question for any @VandyFootball fan or anyone in Nashville: When was the last time Vandy fans stormed the field and tore down goal posts?
— Oscar Combs (@wildcatnews) October 6, 2024
And new goalposts. They probably haven’t replace the goalposts since 1964.
— David Petroff (@DavidPetroff) October 6, 2024
To be fair, stadium security probably wasn’t ready for the fans tearing down the goal posts because the staff has never faced such a scenario before.
In love with the idea that Vandy has no security around the goalposts because unlike the rest of college football they’ve never had to consider this possibility
— Sean Johnson (@SeanIn60Seconds) October 6, 2024
All the buzz killingtons out there telling vandy to act like they’ve been there….they haven’t!?!? Let them go wild and carry the goal posts downtown or do calculus and differential equations or whatever vandy people do for fun #Vanderbilt #Bama
— Alice (@als_131) October 6, 2024
Frankly, the fans initially seemed hesitant about what to do. They didn’t rush the field immediately, nor did they go for the goal posts right away. But that’s all right. This is new, exciting territory for Vanderbilt and some uncertainty was understandable by fans before letting sheer joy and frenzy kick in.
