"It's a fact every Vanderbilt coach, player and fan knows," writes The City Paper's Matt Wilson.

If the Commodores (5-0, 3-0 SEC) win Saturday at Mississippi State, they'll have six wins, which will make them bowl eligible for the first time since 1982.

"You can't ignore it," said coach Bobby Johnson. "They are smart and they know that it's there and you can't fool them. I told them (Sunday) we're not worried about getting six wins, we're worrying about playing the sixth game."

You've got to commend Johnson for taking that approach, and it seems to have rubbed off on his players.

"If you focus on six wins, then you'll probably get five, six or seven," said wide receiver Justin Wheeler, "but if you focus on trying to get 12 wins, you might end up with 10, 11, nine."

He's exactly right. That's why Vanderbilt has refused to look ahead, opting instead to take it one game at a time, no matter how cliche it may seem.

"It feels good right now, honestly," said linebacker Chris Marve, "but we're not finished. We're just five games into the season, we're still working hard, sixth game of the season this week. We're not getting complacent at all.

"We're not satisfied with anything we've done. Of course we're happy about it, but we've got to keep going."

I have no doubt that they will.

A few other links to pass along as I accept the fact that my intramural career might be over (I fractured my patella playing softball over the weekend):

• As I wrote on this site yesterday, Vandy's starting quarterback is up in the air for this weekend, according to The Tennessean's Mo Patton.
• Mackenzi Adams is resilient, writes The Commercial Appeal's Ron Higgins.
• Vandy gets some love in The USA Today.
• The Tennessean's Joe Biddle has a must-read feature on George Smith and the growth of the Commodore program. (I was there for that interview and will be posting something about that later on this week).

Thanks again to Oliver Wolfe for all the great photos from the weekend.