What Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea said this week about facing No. 7 Tennessee

What Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea said during his press conference this week about facing in-state rival and seventh-ranked Tennessee on Saturday afternoon (Noon Eastern Time, ABC) at FirstBank Stadium in Nashville:

Opening Statement

“Obviously I’m excited for the week and our team is excited for the week. This is an important one for us for many reasons. It’s the close of the regular season, final home game for our seniors. There are a number of guys that’ll be honored Saturday that have poured a lot into our program … obviously when you get to play the in-state rival and a team that we haven’t performed well against, that’s the biggest thing to me. We can talk all we want. We need to perform better and we need to close the gap on the field. And that’s the challenge we have. And this is a really good Tennessee team that’s coming to play us. There are not a lot of flaws in their game. Obviously, they’ve been known for their offense. Their defense has been built into one of the best in the country. And they’re really strong on special teams, too. So it’ll take three phases for us, as it always does.”

If Vandy has more depth at this point and can compete more with Tennessee in the final game of the season 

“I think our lack of success in the past has had to do with the just the level of play within our program. Honestly, I think depth obviously comes into play, absolutely, and that’s true of both teams. I think quality depth, too, is another thing. And you can look in our league and I think that’s a challenge for us, is that we have to continue to build quality depth in this program and make sure that our ones and twos, there’s very little margin between the performance in the depth chart. And then, obviously, in certain position you need to roll three deep.

“… I challenged the coaches on, really, Saturday after the game. And then again on Sunday. I challenged the team this morning. This needs to be our best week. And where it’s human nature to kind of turn down the intensity and turn down the volume and and cruise at the finish, we we’re going to sprint to the finish, and we’re going to do everything we can to prepare for what is a challenging opponent, so that we can have fun on Saturday and have fun in the competition.” 

Diego Pavia’s health and how it impacts Vanderbilt’s offense

“Yeah. I mean, I think Diego’s limited. There’s still an ability for him to to to keep us ahead of the chains. I thought he had an explosive run-in the game on Saturday, and we kind of, it was at the back end of that where we felt like we needed to infuse Nate (Johnson) into the offense just to get some of the option game going. But if (Pavia) out there, it’s because he’s going to be able to keep us ahead of the chains and keep us on the field. 

Tennessee playing for a spot in the College Football Playoff, if that could impact this game from Vanderbilt’s side

“There may be (something) externally for the playoff stuff. I mean, that’s just not what we focus on. We’re excited to compete against our in-state rival. And, again, we’re excited to to play better. I think we want to play a better game against them, and hat’s the opportunity we want to seize. We want to send our seniors out the right way.

“… This is always the last game on the schedule and … it’s just I I’ve been sick to my stomach the last three years, whether it’s leaving Knoxville or leaving our stadium here. Just it doesn’t sit well. So that’s what our focus is on. And how do we pull the best performance out of our team, and how do we represent ourselves in a way that makes us proud.”

If he thinks the preparation for a rivalry game should be any different than other games 

“Well, the era of college football is such that, again, you have so much roster transition that I think some of the rivalries can be lost. The unique thing about this game is that it’s extremely personal to me. Right? Because I grew up in this city. I grew up following this program. I played in this program, as did Jovan Haye, as did some of other staff members. So we understand. And the meaning of this game cuts deep to us. So my job is to communicate that and to communicate how important it is as a member of this football program that we prepare in a way and show up in a way that represents and reflects the pride of the Vanderbilt community and our university. And so maybe it’s a little old school, but that stuff still matters to me.” 

Vanderbilt’s defense facing Dylan Sampson, Tennessee’s run game

“… Going to Saturday, if you don’t fit in the right way against this team — there are two things to this. There’s horizontal stretch in the formation and there’s vertical puncture of the run game. And so the splits pull you apart, and the run game is meant to go downhill. And, again, if you’re not really skilled in playing square up front and low and long, and they can move you and you get turned and watched, he will score touchdowns. If you go back to 2022 against the same system, different back, that’s what they did. They ran the ball on us in 2022. So, again, playing square, building our run wall inside out, second-level players understanding how to fit in the in the calls we have. In this plan, we have some four-down, have some three-down. 

“But the message this morning to the defense was you cannot mess around against this team. You just can’t mess around. And the minute you are the other part of this is the horizontal stretch of formation plus the tempo. Right? So the tempo then gets you fatigued and gets you out of position or out of your technique. And now all of a sudden, you’re lifted at the point of attack, and they find the vertical puncture. So it’s a challenge. 

“… We can’t afford to make those mistakes against this team on Saturday, and the kids know that. We’ll put every ounce of our energy into the preparation of it, but it’s going to be about executing it all on Saturday.”