Vanderbilt has real hope after Year 2 under Clark Lea.
Matt Zemek, 16Powers.com
Hope. It is a feeling not annually associated with Vanderbilt football. James Franklin gave the program an injection of optimism and a sense of possibility. The Commodores reached a point where they could realistically expect a winning season under Franklin, but never to the point where they might go 6-2 in the SEC or win 10 games in a season. Merely winning eight games is a huge deal at Vanderbilt. Fighting through the rest of the conference, fighting through the SEC East – which is now made more difficult by the rise of the Tennessee Volunteers under Josh Heupel – is a profound challenge for Vanderbilt. Even in the best of times, a nine- or 10-win standard has been a lot to ask, for obvious reasons. Vanderbilt lags behind most of the SEC in facilities, top-tier achievements, and the other qualities elite recruits and transfer portal prospects look for in a landing spot. Everyone can understand that. Naturally, having real optimism – not just wishing and praying, but real evidence that good times are coming – is not easy to come by in Nashville.
We might have some real optimism entering 2023.
Clark Lea had to eat a lot of bitter losses in his first year on the job in 2021 after coming over from Notre Dame. He went from being Brian Kelly’s defensive coordinator on a College Football Playoff team to losing games on a weekly basis and knowing that he would need at least three if not four years to get his program to bowl eligibility, let alone an eight-win standard. It was a total culture change, but here’s the thing: Clark Lea wanted that. He wanted the challenge. He wanted the heavy lifting of remaking Vanderbilt, starting from scratch, and building from the ground up.
Some coaches want the ready-made situation where they can come in and make quick fixes to create a great team. Some coaches are able to pull that off, and it’s to their credit when they do. Yet, it’s hard not to appreciate the coaches who want to tackle the biggest challenge and spend several years of their careers trying to solve problems which have historically been difficult to fix. Clark Lea wanted this kind of test after being at a program (Notre Dame) where so many recruiting advantages and leverage points exist.
After two seasons at Vanderbilt, it’s not as though Lea is well on his way to greatness – assuming success at VU is never something which can be taken for granted, as though it is inevitable or bound to happen – but the chances of Vanderbilt going to a bowl in 2023 are significantly higher than a lot of people ever could have imagined one year ago at this time.
Consider the progress Vanderbilt made in 2022 under Lea’s watch: For one thing, Vanderbilt won two SEC games. This came after losing 26 SEC games in a row. Vanderbilt entered 2022 having failed to win a single SEC game in the 2020s. VU was “0 for the decade.” Lea not only snapped that streak but then won a second game. Vanderbilt won at Kentucky against a program which won the Citrus Bowl a year earlier. The Commodores then knocked off Florida and quarterback Anthony Richardson, beating Billy Napier and forcing the Gators to go back to the drawing board. It would have been one thing if VU had beaten total bottom-feeders such as Texas A&M and Auburn, the two teams which had the worst seasons of anyone in the SEC this past year, but no – Vanderbilt took down two teams which qualified for bowl games. These were good wins, and in the case of the Kentucky game, Vanderbilt won it by coming back in the fourth quarter. The Florida game was a game VU largely controlled most of the way, but the Kentucky game was an uphill battle for much of the fourth quarter. VU still went into Lexington and made huge late-game plays to pull out a 24-21 decision over Mark Stoops. That game caused Kentucky and Stoops to shake up their coaching staff and seek a fresh start with their pool of assistants.
Vanderbilt’s win over Florida was as close to a complete game as the Commodores have delivered in the SEC. They got out to a big lead and held on to defeat a program which expects to compete for national championships but is nowhere close to that standard under Billy Napier. Lea looked like a coach who was more comfortable with his team and his personnel than Napier, a sign of growth and adaptability in a cutthroat conference where leaders have to be nimble and able to adjust relatively quickly.
The formula for bowl eligibility among lower-tier SEC teams is to get at least two conference wins and go 4-0 in nonconference play. The 2-6 plus four plan, some might call it. If a team can schedule four manageable out-of-conference foes and then grab two wins in the SEC, that’s a bowl bid. If a team can win three SEC games, it allows for a cushion. It can schedule one really tough nonconference game which turns into a loss, but can still go 3-1 in the noncon slate, 3-5 in the SEC, and reach the magic 6-6 mark which provides bowl eligibility.
Vanderbilt beat Florida and Kentucky in 2022. Imagine what this team can do if it can win against Missouri and Auburn in 2023. Wake Forest, a nonconference opponent, won’t have Sam Hartman at quarterback anymore. Could that game be winnable? It certainly seems like it. The idea that Vanderbilt could go 6-6 next year does not seem like a pipe dream. It seems entirely possible.
Clark Lea has Vanderbilt fans believing something better can be achieved. That’s no small feat.
