Vanderbilt fourth-year football coach Clark Lea is as committed as ever to turning the Commodores into a consistent winner.
He’s just having to do so now following a sizable step back.
Lea, who experienced rough seasons as a Vanderbilt fullback from 2002-04, had a 2-10 debut record in Nashville in 2021 but followed that up with a 5-7 improvement two years ago, with that season containing a road win against Kentucky and a home triumph over Florida. Momentum abounded heading into last season, but the Commodores slid back to 2-10, defeating Hawaii and Alabama A&M in their first two games before losing 10 straight.
In Vandy’s eight Southeastern Conference setbacks, the Commodores were defeated by the average score of 40-17 and lost all eight by at least 16 points.
“A year ago, I spoke to you about our program taking the next step and about building on the progress we made from year one to year two,” Lea said Monday afternoon as the SEC’s annual media days event opened in Dallas. “As I’ve said in the past, success is seldom linear. Unfortunately, we dipped in our performance, and fell well short of our goal of competing in postseason play.