LEXINGTON, Ky. — The weather was, at times, miserable. The play on the field was often miserable.
But in the end, it was one of the most beautiful sights in the world.
Mike Wright’s 8-yard touchdown pass to Will Sheppard with 32 seconds left in the game gave Vanderbilt a 24-21 victory at No. 24 Kentucky, breaking all sorts of long losing streaks for the Commodores on a gray and frozen day on Kroger Field.
“Really emotional. It’s been a grind. It’s been a real grind,” Vandy senior Gavin Schoenwald said. “And I’m just really proud of everybody that stuck here after the coaching change and then stuck here again after the tough year last year. Half our team is first-year guys in our program. This is just the beginning.
“This is just a taste of the success to come in the future, and I couldn’t be prouder to be a part of it.”
Schoenwald had gathered his teammates in a huddle near midfield during pregame warmups. He delivered an impassioned speech to the Dores about what the day could be, what the day should be.
Schoenwald, a fifth-year senior who has been a part of all the program’s 28 straight defeats to Power 5 opponents, 26 straight losses to SEC teams and 16 straight SEC road defeats, was hit with strong emotion in the most celebratory of all celebratory locker rooms.
“Obviously, the conditions were wild,” Schoenwald said of the snow and the rain and the wind and the cold. “We had a bunch of fun in warmups and just felt like we were really wanting to be there. Sometimes in those games, teams aren’t. I’m not saying Kentucky wasn’t, but we sure as hell were.
“I’m just really really proud of the guys. They brought it. Set the tone from the start. Just awesome.”
How Vandy pulled off this win was somewhat emblematic of what had transpired to this point. So many defeats, some lopsided and some heartbreaking, would have made a different team lie down.
But, as second year Vanderbilt head coach Clark Lea, who battled the flu all week, told the team in the locker room after the game, a “normal team” wouldn’t keep fighting when “called back into the fire.”
“These moments we will always remember,” Lea said. “No one will ever be able to take this from us.”
The Commodores (4-6, 1-5 SEC) led for most of the game Saturday until Kentucky took a 15-14 lead with 2:59 left in the third quarter. Vandy got a 26-yard field goal to take the lead at 17-15 with just less than six minutes to play.
It took…