A YEAR INTO his tenure at Vanderbilt, Clark Lea took to the stage at SEC media days in July 2022, and made a bold proclamation: "Vanderbilt football will be the best program in the country."
The statement drew immediate guffaws, in the room and across social media. No one wins at Vandy. The Commodores hadn't had a winning season in nine years, and the Commodores hadn't finished a season in the AP top 20 since 1948.
Lea didn't care. He had a plan to turn Vandy from a laughingstock into a contender. He and his staff would scour the country for the best underdeveloped recruits, build them over three or four years, and create a culture that made the Commodores unique enough that, eventually, the scales would tip.