Nashville, TENN--It's an experience.

Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia sticks out. He walks and talks differently than anyone else. He routinely pulls rabbits out of his hat. He's a fighter. He's uniquely and consistently himself in a way that's rare.

That's a result of confidence, which Pavia has an endless supply of.

Pavia's confidence isn't a one-off, though.

It's a testament to who he's surrounded with, what his environment looks like and how he was raised. Pavia was born for this.

"I've been doing this since I was a little kid," Pavia said after his performance in Vanderbilt's win over No. 1 Alabama.

Perhaps that's why 68 of his friends and family travelled to Nashville for that game or why that group bought out a DJ for Vanderbilt's family tailgate. Maybe that's why Pavia's brother felt comfortable guaranteeing a Vanderbilt win over Alabama.

Those around Pavia believed just as much as he did. Those outside of Vanderbilt's building and Pavia's family were shocked by Vanderbilt knocking off the nation's No. 1 team.

That was always the standard for the contingent that travelled all the way from New Mexico, though.

"We only celebrate when he wins," Pavia's brother Roel, who often dons Vanderbilt-colored overalls at games, said. "That’s it."

A mentality along those lines came from Pavia's mother, Antoinette Padilla, years ago.

The single mother made her standards clear.

“She raised me a winner," Pavia said of Padilla. "My mom, she hates losing more than she loves winning."

The Pavia's do love them some winning, though.

They also love what happens after. They call that a show in itself.

"In words you can’t really describe it, you got to be there to experience it," Roel said. "We call this the Pavia experience. We roll deep, everyone from Albuquerque, all our friends and family, all who’s riding with us."

Pavia can't describe his family adequately, either.

What he can articulate is how he believes people would gravitate towards them.

"If they put a camera on those guys they’d go viral every single time," Pavia said of his brothers and friends. "Those guys are like ‘holy s**t.’ Some of the stuff ain’t right, but it’s pure comedy. People would love it. If they put a camera on all of us people would pay to watch that."

Pavia is often motivated by his opportunity to provide an experience worth noting for the people behind him.

"I got to win at all costs so everyone has fun," Pavia said. “Johnny Manziel used to say ‘win or lose, we booze,’ but we ain’t partying, we ain’t having fun if we don’t win."

The Pavia's aren't just about celebrating, though. They're more about taking pride in one of their own doing things that nobody else thought possible.

They're about finding a way to be there even when it's inconvenient.

That's a type of love that Pavia believes is unique to his home state.

“It takes a lot of money, a lot of people aren’t rich, they come from the poor south valley," Pavia said of the trek that his friends and family made to Nashville for the game against Alabama. "Super thankful for them, I feel like they were in my corner tonight."

Saturday's showing in the stands wasn't unique. Perhaps the number was bigger than normal, but the same core group was there as always.

Pavia's mother makes what Pavia calls "98%" of his games, his brothers make "97%" and his younger sister Abrielle makes appearances, as well.

Roel Jr. and Javy, Pavia's brothers, didn't always have blind support for their brother. They sometimes had to push. That's because none of them were ok with losing.

"Since I was a kid, I was the oldest my younger brother whipped my a**, Diego whipped my a** because they didn’t want to lose," Roel said. "That’s how much they had it preached to them. I want them to win as much as they do."

"It might’ve took us once or twice to get him but we found a way to get him," Javy added.

With Abrielle it's the same tune, but it's conveyed in a different manner. Pavia wants his eighth-grade sister, who has division-one basketball offers, to win at life.

Instead of focusing on confidence and flair, Pavia teaches his sister about surrender.

"I try to get her to follow Christ because I was raised in a Catholic home but really never went to church, never really anything with that so I try to get her in the Gospels," Pavia said in regards to his sister. "I’m a Christian so I try to tell her what’s right, what’s wrong."

Pavia wasn't always in a position where he could teach, though. At times he uninspired spiritually.

"I didn’t have a relationship with God ever, just was kinda living out doing my own thing," Pavia said. [I was] doing whatever I wanted. I got into trouble sometimes and I really didn’t know what to do."

That changed when he encountered his teammates Dalton Bowles, Carson Sullivan and Josh Beard at New Mexico Military Institute. That group gave Pavia a Bible and extended an invite.

The Bible study in which that invitation was for sparked curiosity in the eyes of Pavia, who didn't know he needed a change in his life.

"I didn’t know that there was something bigger than myself, my ego was so big," Pavia said. "We’d have Bible study every Sunday and I would hate going it’d be like ‘I don’t need it’ and sooner or later it was like [God] started working in my life."

Some of that work was done through current Vanderbilt tight end Eli Stowers, who is now Pavia's go-to target and roommate.

Before he was Pavia's safety blanket he was his mentor, though. He was his example.

"Eli is probably the most important person who’s brought me to Christ," Pavia said. "I kinda get emotional about it because he’s someone who lives the closest I’ve ever seen to Christ. He’s someone who I look up to, who I kinda want to be like in my faith. He’s really held me to the standard."

As a result, Pavia now holds himself to a higher standard. He wants to "live right."

He's seen how that can affect his life since a revelation he had in the spring.

"I was playing here in the spring and I wasn’t doing my best and I wasn’t living right either, not fully right, I was sleeping one night and I woke up from a dream and the dream was like ‘you start living right and you’ll get whatever you want,'" Pavia said. "He was just like ‘start living right and I’m gonna prepare this way for you of how your life should be’ ever since that day it changed my life."

Pavia acknowledges he's not perfect and won't ever be, but sees a better way of living ahead of him.

"I still sin but I’ve been trying to be better," Pavia said. "I’ve gotta watch my mouth a little bit more."

Even through his postgame cussing, Pavia can see the work that's been done in his life. He can see that his journey from an un-recruited, undersized high school quarterback to the talk of the country isn't an accident.

He also believes that it wouldn't have been possible on his own.

"Me being here, it wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t know Christ and if I didn’t start taking my journey and things like that seriously," Pavia said. "God put me in that place for a reason’ I had real life dreams and I told myself as a young kid I’d play SEC football. I couldn’t go straight to the SEC because I would’ve never known God.

"The reason why he put me in junior college is to get to know him."

Now Pavia knows God, he looks back on that process with perspective and he's arrived.

Pavia believes that never would have happened without faith. Perhaps it also wouldn't have happened without him being himself.

Vanderbilt general manager Barton Simmons certainly thinks it wouldn't have.

"I think he's been the best quarterback in college football to this point, I believe that," Simmons said. "It's less the play and more the person and how that can seep through a roster."

Pavia isn't worried about that declaration, though. He's just trying to make his people proud.

"I don’t know if there’s ever been a quarterback who’s started in the SEC as a quarterback from New Mexico. So it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity for all of us to enjoy this."