Ole Miss–Vanderbilt football rivalry

The Ole Miss–Vanderbilt football rivalry is an American college football rivalry game played annually by the Ole Miss Rebels football team of the University of Mississippi and the Vanderbilt Commodores football team of Vanderbilt University. The Rebels are the Commodores' second-longest, continuous football rivalry.

Both teams are founding members of the Southeastern Conference (SEC), and their universities have the two smallest student body populations among SEC schools. This similar size, the schools' proximity to one another (Nashville is less than four hours from Oxford), and the similar culture of Greek life (both schools' student bodies have high percentages of participation in fraternities and sororities) led them to be picked as annual inter-divisional rivals when the SEC grew to twelve teams for the 1992 season.

The schools have lately been rather evenly matched in scoring. From 1999 to 2012 Ole Miss has scored 323 = 23.07 points per game and Vandy has scored 340 = 24.28 ppg. Ole Miss from 1999 to 2006 had won six games and lost only two. From 2007 to 2012 Vandy has won five and lost one.

Series history
The first game between the two teams was played on would later be named Currey Field on Vanderbilt's campus in Nashville, Tennessee on November 10, 1894. That year the Commodores, led by Coach Henry Thorton and W.J. Keller, led Vanderbilt to a 40-0 win over the Mississippi Flood (as the Rebels were known until 1936).

Early in the series, Vanderbilt dominated under legendary Coach Dan McGugin (for whom the Vanderbilt athletics complex is named). The two teams played 10 games before Ole Miss even scored against Vanderbilt (scoring 2 points in a 1910 loss in Nashville). It was during this period that Vanderbilt won a game by the largest margin between the teams, winning 91-0 on October 23, 1915.

Ole Miss would not beat Vanderbilt until 1939, when the newly-christened Rebels welcomed the Commodores for Vanderbilt's first away game against Ole Miss on November 4. The Rebels won, 14-7. Three years later, on November 7, 1942, Vanderbilt won its first away-game victory over the Rebels, winning 19-0 in Oxford.

World War II intervened, and the teams didn't play again until 1945. But when they did, Ole Miss remembered their last game, and the Rebels recorded their first win in Nashville, 14-7, on October 6, 1945.

In 1947, the Commodores were ranked No. 10 in the country, and the Rebels were No. 18. At a packed game in Nashville, Vanderbilt won a close contest, 10-6.

As the 1950s wore on, the Rebels began to dominate the series. Vanderbilt won, 34-20, in 1951, but the Commodores wouldn't beat the Rebels again until 23 years later, with a 1974 win over Ole Miss, 24-14. In the meantime, the Rebels went 17-0-2 against Vanderbilt, with the ties coming in 1952 and 1964. It was during this period that Ole Miss was consistently ranked in the nation's Top 10, with the Commodores losing to a no. 2-ranked Ole Miss squad in 1960 and 1961.

While Ole Miss continued to win far more games in the 1980s and 90s, Vanderbilt fared better than the did during the middle decades of the century, going 6-18-0. The 1989 game was perhaps the most memorable of this period, but in a tragic fashion; Ole Miss cornerback Chucky Mullins suffered a broken neck during the game that left him a quadriplegic, and ultimately died from complications of the injury in 1991.

In the last decade, the Rebels and Commodores have achieved a level of parity: Vanderbilt leads 6-4 overall, and Vanderbilt has won 6 of the last 8 contests between the two schools.

Overall scores are close to even after 85 games Ole Miss has scored 1596 overall points (18.78 ppg) Vanderbilt has 1439 overall points (16.93 ppg) only 1.85 points between them points-per game.

All-time records
Ole Miss leads the all–time series, 47–37-2, but the Rebels didn't assume that lead for good until their 1985 win (which put the series at 29-28-2). Prior to 1967, some games between the two teams were not played at their on-campus stadiums. Besides Oxford and Nashville, the Rebels and Commodores have also squared off in Memphis, Tennessee and Jackson, Mississippi.

Vanderbilt leads the series when playing in Memphis or in Mississippi (20-19). Ole Miss leads when games are played in Nashville, Tennessee (27-15-2).

Fifteen times that the teams have played, one or both has been ranked in the Top 25. When the two teams have played, Ole Miss has been in the Top 25 fourteen times, and Vanderbilt three times.

Game results
''Vanderbilt victories are shaded in ██ black. Ole Miss victories are shaded in ██ blue.''Ties are in white