When Clark Lea left his role as defensive coordinator at Notre Dame to become Vanderbilt’s next head coach, many believed the Commodores could fight their way out of the doldrums in the SEC. Unfortunately, after improving from 2-10 to 5-7, Vanderbilt fell to 2-10 last year, putting pressure on Lea to right the ship. Here are the three biggest takeaways from his time at the SEC Media Days podium.
Three Takeaways From Clark Lea Talking at SEC Media Days
1) Diego Pavia Not Handed Starting QB Role
The Commodores made a splash by landing New Mexico State transfer Diego Pavia and hiring his offensive coordinator, Tim Beck. Under Beck, the Aggies finished the season No. 14 in rushing offense and No. 12 in offensive yards per play in the FBS.
As the leader of the unit, Pavia enjoyed his own individual success, throwing for nearly 3,000 yards, 26 touchdowns, and nine interceptions to go along with 928 yards and seven scores on the ground.
Yet, Lea isn’t simply handing the keys of the offense to Pavia; he has to earn it.
“Diego brings experience, competitive edge. We’ve already felt his presence in our locker room. There is a quarterback competition we’re undergoing right now, and that will be true up until we play Virginia Tech. We are glad to have him just like we are glad to have the other additions to our roster. For those that know Diego, know he’s a unique competitor
with just — he just exudes edge and really proud to have him in black and gold.”
Pavia will compete with Utah transfer Nate Johnson, who was a four-star recruit in the 2022 class. The former Ute played in seven games (three starts) last season, completing 39 of 72 passes for 499 yards and three TDs, adding another 232 yards and four scores on 58 carries.
2) Lea the Defensive Coordinator
After winning the first two games of the season, Vanderbilt lost their final 10 games, allowing at least 31 points in each. As a result, Lea demoted defensive coordinator Nick Howell, who ultimately left the program to become the DC at New Mexico.
In 2024, Lea will call the defense for the first time since becoming Vanderbilt’s head coach. To help ease the load, he brought in former New Mexico State HC Jerry Kill in a consultant role. Lea provided more insight into the decision at Media days:
“We anticipated this just in the design of this staff. So when you look at like the addition of Jerry Kill, we felt like he was going to be able to be a part of and wear a headset and be influential. We also added Steve Gregory, who, Steve is someone I’ve worked with at Syracuse and have a lot of respect for — was secondary coach for the Lions, secondary coach for the Dolphins — who joins us as the associate defensive coordinator. He’s the guy that’s going to really help me and support me as I take on two roles.”
As Notre Dame’s DC, Lea’s unit never ranked lower than the top 25 nationally in nearly every meaningful statistic and helped the Fighting Irish to two College Football Playoff appearances (2018 and 2020).
3) Welcoming NIL and the Transfer Portal
As a bottom-dweller program in one of the strongest conferences in the country, Lea needed to embrace the new transfer portal and NIL era in order to compete, and it appears he has finally done so.
“Falling behind in the NIL and transfer portal spaces erased much of the progress we made in our first two years. As I’ve said in the past: It’s impossible to function in the portal without resources … we’ve been able to adjust and adapt.”
The Commodores added 53 new players this offseason, 20+ of whom were transfers. Lea’s original roster construction plan was to build up through recruits and the foundation laid by the previous regime, but after three years of paltry results, he realized it was time to accept change.
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“Part of it is you come in with a blueprint of program building,” Lea said at spring meetings. “And this has become a game of team building, and that is what it is. So, when you look at the work we’ve done to overhaul our roster in general, we took a more traditional approach — we wanted to give guys more opportunity to change and improve, and we held on to some of the guys that were with the program that when we got there. I think that’s what college football has been.
“Obviously, it’s been turned upside down. I don’t believe in the total, you know, roster purge. I think there’s reason to have a blended approach where you’re still trying to build a foundation. Because, for me, this has always been about how you sustain success. Now we unfortunately didn’t continue the progress we made in 2022, and so that set a course for us to make some changes in our approach, and that’s what we’ve done. But that’s the reason; it just wasn’t a part of the initial design.”
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