I was planning to put up a post this afternoon explaining why Vanderbilt's fast start was no fluke, but The Tennessean's Mo Patton beat me to it. Patton lists five reasons why Vanderbilt has been able to go from an SEC doormat to one of the nation's best, and I couldn't agree more with all of them.

1. Minimizing Penalties: Mark Richt should learn from the Commodores, who don't hurt themselves. They have just 16 penalties all season.

2. Great special teams play: The punt coverage has been the most noticeable difference from last year, in my opinion.

"(Upson's) done a fantastic job of helping us maintain or regain field position," Johnson said Monday. "He's worked extremely hard on directional kicking and our rugby kicking and our pooch kicking, and they've all paid off for us this year."

3. Finishing strong: Vanderbilt has outscored opponents 58-10 in the final 30 minutes thanks to terrific half-time adjustments, along with a belief that they're going to win.

"I think the best thing we do is we figure out what's not working real well in the first half and we eliminate it," Johnson said, "and that gives our guys a chance to go out with the calls we are going to make and be confident with them, play hard, play fast and know what they're executing."

4. Effective in the red zone: Vanderbilt has essentially scored on all 18 drives when they've gone inside the red zone. You can't beat that.

5. Getting turnovers: The Commodores have a +9 turnover margin, which leads the nation.

So while Vanderbilt may be 10th in the SEC in total defense and 12th in total defense, it's easy to see why it has been successful. Furthermore, Johnson said those aren't the statistics he places much importance on.

"I think scoring defense is a huge stat and scoring offense," he said. "We worry about wins and losses, and things like net punting, things that have a direct effect on the game, turnover margin, red-zone scoring, those things are important."

Those are also things the Commodores are doing well.

Now, onto some links as I revel in the fact that my knee injury isn't as serious as first thought (no surgery required, 1-2 months recovery) and I can make the trip to Starkville this weekend.

• ESPN.com's Chris Low writes that Miss. State '07 = Vandy '08.
  
• Low also ranks Jamie Bryant and Robbie Caldwell among his top 15 position coaches in the SEC.
  
• Bobby Johnson still hasn't named a starting quarterback for this weekend (Who do you guys think it should be?)
• The Bulldogs have a lot of respect for Vandy and are calling this game a "must-win."
• Sly Croom is a big fan of BoJo and says that for the Bulldogs to win Saturday, they'll have to play "a lot like Vanderbilt."
• In you haven't seen it already, check out my column for SI On Campus (I had nothing to do with the title, I promise).
• And, if you want to check out all of the Vanderbilt stories from the day, make sure to visit our good friends over at Star and Stripe (they're definitely worth bookmarking).
• Finally, it looks like our fans were onto something.

  Don't you love how Vanderbilt helped get an offensive coordinator fired?