'I Would Probably Say That's Been the Hardest Part,' Clark Lea Reflects on Vanderbilt Football's Culture Change

Atlanta–Too often Clark Lea would do anything he could to galvanize those within and around his program in the months following him taking the Vanderbilt job in 2021 and just couldn’t get through to them. 

What Lea said was that however hard he would try, there was nothing he could do in order to convince them that he was building something worthwhile. No matter how cogent and articulate Lea was, there was an attitude ingrained within his subjects that he couldn’t change. 

Most of those people believed that they’d seen enough Vanderbilt football over the years to know how this was going to end. They’d heard plenty of visions for how the program would be different over the years, yet there was no change. It was just the same-old Vanderbilt over and over again, no matter what. As much as they liked Lea, they just didn’t believe that his program could win. 

“Same old Vanderbilt,” many of them thought. They all hoped that something would change, but they were jaded and a number of them were developing some apathy towards Vanderbilt’s program after its 2020 campaign in which it finished 0-9. 

“I learned pretty quickly at Vanderbilt just how damaged we were mentally,” Lea said at SEC Media Days. “I would say that's probably been the hardest part of this build, is draining the program of that attitude. Also shifting the ancillary aspect of our program from a losing approach to a winning approach. That's taken time.”

Four seasons, an SEC Coach of the Year award, a win over No. 1 Alabama and the program’s first winning season since 2013 later and perhaps some of the conversations Lea has with his fanbase nowadays look different than they did when he first took the Vanderbilt job. 

Within his building things have changed, though. If they hadn’t, his program wouldn’t have a chance to take any step forward. Lea learned that the hard way with what he appeared to believe was his most talented team to date in 2023. Vanderbilt’s coaching staff believed they had a team that could push for bowl eligibility that season, but instead it finished 2-10 and Lea had to do everything he could in order to strip his locker room of the attitudes that hampered it. 

Too many players on that team were okay with being late. Too many of its best players chose to look out for themselves and advised teammates to do the same when transfer portal season came around rather than buying in to what Lea had to sell. The standards that their coaches preached went in one ear and out the other. Lea needed to overhaul his roster. 

Now, he can feel comfortable bringing three players–including Diego Pavia, who says he wants to win a national championship–to SEC Media Days and letting them loose to make declarations about what they plan to do once they get out on the field. He believes that they’re not all talk, either. 

“I think at this point we can confidently say ‘hey, our expectation is to win,’” Lea said. “We know that winning isn't easy. We know there will be ups and downs. The way we impact the outcome is to focus in the moment. We have proof of concept when we did these things a year ago we were able to come out on top.”

As Lea’s program has ascended towards the mentality and level of performance that he wished it had all along, he realized something about how it happened that a younger him didn’t. The Vanderbilt head coach figured out that he didn’t have to convince everyone that he was the guy for the job. 

He just had to prove it. 

“There were things that I was hard charging about, separating from our past, again, beating back this mentality that had forever stained the program. I was obsessed with it,” Lea said. “Part of my development is learning how to let that go and really focusing on, hey, what is the type of head coach I want to be and what is the kind of team I want to have.”