OXFORD, Miss. - Vanderbilt gave Mississippi everything it wanted, but running back Jaylen Walton and a huge stop by the defense were the differences in the No. 3 Rebels' 27-16 victory at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium on Saturday night.

Walton ran 21 times for 133 yards, including a game-clinching 3-yard scoring run with 6:47 left, as Ole Miss (4-0, 2-0) kept its SEC and national title hopes in good standing by beating the Commodores at home for the first time in its last four tries.

With Vanderbilt trailing by four midway through the fourth quarter, the Rebels' Chad Kelly threw the ball out of bounds on third-and-7 from the Ole Miss 49. But a pass interference penalty on cornerback Torren McGaster kept the drive alive, and Walton - who had success running outside all night - gashed the Commodores for runs of 24 and 14 to set up his score.

Once it was over, the Rebels and a partisan crowd of 60,654 fans could finally exhale.

"As a senior and someone who's been in those type of environments, I let my teammates understand that we're going to get everybody's best. Everybody is going to play their best against us," said Ole Miss linebacker Denzel Nkemdiche, who had 12 solo stops and two assists.

Ole Miss moved the ball on Vanderbilt (1-3, 0-2) throughout the night, but struggled in the red zone. It caught up to the Rebels when the Commodores' Johnny McCrary found running back Ralph Webb with a 7-yard scoring toss on third-and-goal to knot the score at 13 with 7:39 left in the third.

Finally, the Rebels seemed to break through when defensive tackle Robert Nkemdiche - lining up at running back - scored on a 1-yard run with 1:25 left in the third, giving Ole Miss a 20-13 lead.

However, Vanderbilt bounced back with Tommy Openshaw's 34-yard field goal with 12:12 to play, and threatened moments later when safety Jahmel McIntosh picked off Kelly and returned the ball to the Rebel 19.

But the Rebels' Woodrow Hamilton broke through the middle of the line and stuffed Webb for a 4-yard loss on third-and-1 and Openshaw pulled the ensuing field goal wide left, keeping the deficit at four.

Ole Miss had a 278-111 edge in total offense in the first half, but Vanderbilt made plays at the right times to keep the score at 13-3.

The Commodores held Ole Miss to a season-low 27 points.

"We just do what we do. I don't think there's any secret sauce," Vanderbilt coach Derek Mason said. "I think it's in who we are and how we play and how we function."

Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze knows his team staved off a challenge.

"We struggled with their two-man twist that gave us pressure. They went two man a lot. We didn't either have a good call for it, or we didn't win the areas we needed to win in," Freeze said.

The Commodores found something briefly when they went to their up-tempo offense in the first quarter. Vanderbilt moved the ball 73 yards in 19 plays and put Ole Miss behind for the first time all year when Openshaw hit a 28-yard field goal.

But the Rebels took just 1:02 to answer, taking the lead when Kelly hit Damore'ea Stringfellow with a 20-yard throw near the front right end zone pylon, and Gary Wunderlich's point-after made it 7-3.

Two second-quarter Wunderlich field goals, coming from 19 and 39 yards, helped pad the Rebels' lead.

"We had opportunities and tonight, we lost to a good Ole Miss Rebel football team. ... I tell these guys there's never any solace in that," Mason said. "We play the game to win. We came here to win. We came up a little short. For us, we'll look at this game for the things we did, and the things we didn't get done."

Walton's 215 all-purpose yards were a career high.

"I always harp on, with me being my size, be someone today," Walton said. "I watched [LSU running back] Leonard Fournette, and the way he ran, so today I was going to see if I could do the same stuff. I'm not comparing myself to Fournette, but just my mentality to run the ball really hard."

Kelly threw for 321 yards and a score on 42 attempts, but also had two interceptions.

"I don't have to watch the film on the two picks. Those were just really, really bad reads," Freeze said.

NOTES: Ole Miss LT Laremy Tunsil was held out again amidst an NCAA investigation into alleged improper benefits he received. ... Ole Miss starting S Tony Conner was held with a torn meniscus, for which he had surgery on Tuesday. ... Vanderbilt held out starting ILB Nigel Bowden due to a concussion. He didn't make the trip to Oxford. ... Ole Miss junior pitcher Brady Bramlett sang the national anthem. ... Ole Miss wore its powder blue helmets for the second week in a row, while Vanderbilt wore its all-white uniforms for the first time this season.