Clark Lea: Vanderbilt owning CFP snub amid 'entitlement' from others

Vanderbilt was one of several possible at-larges who were officially left out of the College Football Playoff on Sunday. However, despite the disappointment of that, Clark Lea says the Commodores will be trying to take the right approach about it given the season that they did have this fall.

Lea spoke on their program’s reaction to not making the CFP during an appearance on ‘SportsCenter’ on Monday afternoon. He said they’ve decided to own what they themselves did wrong to not make the playoff. They lost two games that, despite having the best season in school history at 10-2, gave Vandy no guarantee of a berth and had them instead at the mercy of the CFP Selection Committee.

“Well, we met to kind of announce the bowl site yesterday afternoon. That was before the guys were going into the weight room to lift,” said Lea. “And, the message was just, hey, we had control over this at Alabama and at Texas, and we did not do enough. I think it’s really important that we take ownership over the things that we did have control over rather than complain about whatever decisions are being left out. Like, we can’t be victims in this situation, because I think there’s a level of entitlement that exists in that. That cuts against the DNA of our program. So, the conversation was, hey, the world expects us to be disappointed right now, but what we are is excited.”

With that answer, namely the wording of “complain”, “victims”, or “entitlement”, Lea was then naturally asked about Notre Dame, who took a different approach than excitement as they opted out of a bowl game after controversially missing the CFP. He chose to show respect in his answer to the Fighting Irish, a program where he was linebackers coach and defensive coordinator for five years before becoming the Commodores’ head coach. However, as for his current program, Vanderbilt just wants to play football once more this season.

“I want to be really careful, because I’ve got a ton of respect for Marcus and that program. And, obviously, spent a lot of time up there, and so a lot of affection for them,” said Lea. “But, just to say, to speak on Vanderbilt Football, there was no decision, you know. There was no conversation around decision. This program is going to play football. Put the ball down and let’s play. That’s who we are. That’s what we do. We tried to get a 13th game last week. We weren’t able to clear the hurdles in time, so we got the 13th game. It’s just December 31st. That’s our mentality. We love playing the game of football. It’s what we do. We build our relationships around it. We build our culture through it.”

“As football people, which is what we are in this program, it’s just so exciting, and so we’re looking forward to this time we get to spend together, right,” Lea continued. “Like, this morning, we had a short practice, but it was just really about going out and having fun around the game that we share and love. We’ll do that through the week. We’ll turn our attention to Iowa next week, get some time at home for Christmas, and then go have a great team celebration down in Tampa.”

A lot of programs were upset yesterday when they, even with great seasons and resumés, missed the College Football Playoff. Vanderbilt, though, is choosing to move on from it as best they can, and turn their attention now to finishing their all-time season with a final chance to take the field in the ReliaQuest Bowl come New Year’s Eve.

“We have a great opportunity, and it’s a great celebration on a tremendous bowl stage in a great city against a really challenging Big Ten opponent,” said Lea.

“We get one more opportunity to do this together,” Lea said. “I am going to enjoy every day of this, and I will absolutely soak up every minute on the field, with this team, on December 31st.”