How Vanderbilt has gone from SEC doormat to CFP contender

NASHVILLE -- Earlier this summer, Australian Football League manager Damien Hardwick stumbled crossed the Netflix series, "Any Given Saturday," which followed SEC teams passim the 2024 season.

Hardwick, manager of the Gold Coast Suns successful Queensland, was fascinated portion watching the 3rd episode, "Shock the World," which documented Vanderbilt's 40-35 upset of then-No. 1 Alabama connected Oct. 5, 2024.

It was the Commodores' archetypal triumph implicit a No. 1-ranked squad and their archetypal implicit the Crimson Tide successful 40 years.

Led by an undersized, fiery backmost and a coaching unit convinced it could instrumentality connected the world, Vanderbilt flipped the publication from being the SEC's perennial punching container to satellite beaters.

"The nine I'm astatine present is very, precise similar," Hardwick said. "A spot of a laughingstock, a spot of a joke. People utilized to travel to our spot for a holiday."

The Gold Coast Suns, an enlargement squad that joined the AFL successful 2009, had ne'er captured a last bid berth successful their 16-year past until this past season. Hardwick was truthful impressed by Vanderbilt manager Clark Lea and the civilization helium built that helium and 4 of his assistants took a 22-hour formation to the United States and spent 2 days with the Commodores this week.

"He's a connector," Hardwick said of Lea. "We were fortunate capable to beryllium successful his meeting, and I felt similar moving done a ceramic partition for him with the mode helium goes astir it. He's conscionable a precise astute operator. The mode helium gets his radical to bash large things is what makes a large coach, and that's the crushed I deliberation they're having success."

Lea and backmost Diego Pavia are 2 large reasons for Vanderbilt's success, but they aren't the lone radical down its abrupt translation from SEC also-ran to morganatic College Football Playoff contender.

Heading into Saturday's crippled astatine No. 20 Texas (noon ET, ABC), the Commodores are 7-1 for the archetypal clip since 1941 and No. 9 successful the AP poll, their highest ranking since they were seventh for 1 week successful 1937.

According to Lea, chancellor Daniel Diermeier and diversion manager Candice Storey Lee merit conscionable arsenic overmuch recognition arsenic the players and coaches for providing the fiscal resources and different enactment that antecedently wasn't determination for the shot squad astatine 1 of the country's astir highly regarded world institutions.

"Vanderbilt's ne'er cared astir this program," said Lea, a Vanderbilt fullback from 2002 to 2004. "Well, I shouldn't accidental ne'er due to the fact that of immoderate of the records that we're breaking close now, truthful possibly backmost successful the 1940s oregon whatever. But there's ne'er been a clip wherever it was like, 'Hey, we're going to beryllium truly bully astatine this, and we're going to bash the things we need.'

"In fact, if anything, I deliberation there's been astir a absorption to that for fearfulness that it cuts against a communicative that we're an elite world institution. What our chancellor understands present is that this is the beforehand porch."

Diermeier, who was named Vanderbilt's ninth chancellor successful July 2020, is simply a astir improbable assemblage shot fan. He grew up successful West Berlin, Germany, during the Cold War. He was a sports instrumentality arsenic a child, watching Olympic wrestling and World Cup shot connected TV. He was the archetypal idiosyncratic successful his household to be assemblage and went to USC arsenic an planetary pupil successful 1988.

Diermeier spoke reasonably fluent English but didn't cognize overmuch astir the sports metaphors that are a portion of American vernacular. Someone successful the USC connection laboratory suggested helium ticker sports connected TV to larn astir phrases specified arsenic "got the shot crossed the extremity line" and "hit a location run."

Diermeier wasn't acquainted with shot oregon American shot but decided to travel the sports anyway. The archetypal shot crippled helium watched was Game 1 of the 1988 World Series, successful which Dodge...