Fan expectations are going to be higher than they've ever been. But they lose almost all their best players and the East will almost certainly be better than it has been the last 3 years. The guy is set up to fail from the beginning.
Their smart fans will realize that though. It would make Franklin leaving easier to swallow. I would much, much rather be a Vandy fan than Vandy's AD. He's got a huge and difficult hire to make. Should he pick the DC on the staff? Offensive guru again?
They should go after Cutcliffe from Duke. They can afford him. Both schools have shown that "smart" schools (along with Stanford to an even greater degree) can do well if they want to. I'm not sure either had to alter their entrance standards to achieve it though ... I'm sure it was quite a bit.
Not exactly. I think their athletic department is part of something like student life. Basically their athletic director is not only in charge of NCAA sports but also intramural and club sports. I think their justification was that they needed to de-emphasize athletics and basically put it on part with other student experiences, part of a college experience for some students but not bigger or more important than other extra curricular. Not sure how it works in practice and it's funny they did it right before they got good in football, giving them a pretty respectable presence in all three major sports presumably for the first time ever.