Everything Vanderbilt head coach Clark Lea said about facing South Carolina

Vanderbilt head coach Clark Lea spoke to the media on Tuesday to preview the Commodores’ Week 3 matchup with South Carolina. Kickoff on Saturday is at 7:45 p.m. and will be on SEC Network.

Here’s everything Lea had to say about facing the Gamecocks.

Opening statement

“I’m excited. Excited to take this team on the road in the league. Play against a really good South Carolina team in a great environment. We’re going to have to play really well, so we’re challenged with that. That’s also what you sign up for. I think it’s a great test. This is a South Carolina team that, in all three phases, they’re as good as anybody. Defensively, they are fast at all positions. They play really hard. They make it hard to find space. That starts with their EDGE play. Throughout the entire second and third level of their defense, these guys are fast and play hard. Offensively, they have one of the premier players in our game, and (LaNorris Sellers) has got a lot of weapons around him. We are very familiar with that operation and how challenging he can be to a defense. The way he extends plays. The way he creates plays. What he does with the ball in his hand. Again, then he distributes it to some guys that are very capable themselves and then, obviously, special teams.

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“What do you say about Vicari Swain? He’s had a great start to the season. Coach (Shane) Beamer has always taken great pride in special teams play, and we do too. That’s a phase that we want to win. Again, we are going to have to work really hard because it is very important to them, and it shows up with the way they execute in that phase.

“Again, this is a program that feels a lot like ours. Wanting to establish a physical run game. Dynamic play at the quarterback position. Want to play really good on defense. Try to get the ball turned over and have all three phases interlocked. We are going to have to be the best at executing that identity if we want to come away with a win. I believe in our team, and I’m excited to take this team to Columbia and to be tested. I think this is going to be a great week for us and just looking forward to it.”

What do you see out of LaNorris Sellers?

“Well, I think everything that you’d want to see in a quarterback. Not necessarily as someone defending a quarterback. He’s big, physical, smart and makes good decisions with the ball and can create with his legs. He has arm strength. He throws the big post in the Illinois game, just getting absolutely clobbered in the backfield, and I think he gets about half of his follow-through in. Again, he doesn’t have any problem getting the ball there. He’s really talented in all the areas that you’d want a quarterback to be talented in. I don’t know him. Obviously, I have competed against him. Everything I’ve heard about him, he’s a first-class human. Those are the guys you want to compete against. This is going to be a great opportunity for us. I have a ton of respect for him and the way he plays the game.”

How does playing in Blacksburg at Virginia Tech’s Lane Stadium prepare your team for another tough environment this weekend at Williams-Brice Stadium?

“Saturday will be different. It’s not a copy and paste. There is a different song. It has sand in it, but we have to let go of “Enter Sandman” and move on to “Sandstorm.” Virginia Tech was a great experience for us. I think it challenged us in the right ways. I actually felt like we handled that well, too. So, I was proud of the way we worked through that. In fact, we fed the environment early, so we made it harder on ourselves than we needed to. South Carolina is as charged an environment, I feel like, as we have in our league. Playing there at night it feels like a party. Again, if we play well, we can help to water some of that down. If you don’t, then it’s going to be a party. Again, eventually, the ball is put down and football is played.

“What I talk to our team about is that environment is for us. That’s what you want as a player. God, if you were playing during the pandemic and you were playing in empty stadiums, it was brutal. This is exactly what we want, and that crowd is there for you. They are not necessarily going to make it easy on you. We can enjoy that part of it and not be stressed out about it. We’ll prepare the way that we prepared for Virginia Tech with some noise. As long as we are able to operate, we don’t let the 70,000 people get involved, or 80,000, whatever it is, get involved in the game. If we can’t operate, then we give them license to participate, and that makes it extra hard. I want the guys to have fun with it and enjoy it. It will be everything it’s made out to be.”

What’s the challenge of handling the punt coverage when facing a punt returner like Vicari Swain?

“He’s very talented. He takes risks. He’s not afraid to go get the ball in tough settings. One of his touchdowns came off a tipped punt that was bouncing around, that he picked up and circled the coverage team. He’s got the courage that a good returner should have. He has the skills that a good returner should have. But also, it’s the way that they block for him, the design. They are a team that knows how to be aggressive and come after the punter some. They also know how to double up on your best coverage players and try to create space for them.

“The more that we can sustain drives and when we punt, punt out of fourth and manageable situations, I think we are going to have opportunities to slow some of the rush down or slow some of the vicing of gunners and stuff down. If not, if you get behind the chains, the one against Virginia Tech is a perfect example. There is a punt that is re-kicked because of a penalty that went to fourth and long, that then allowed for there to be a return set up that gave them space to make a huge play in that game. When you watch that game, it comes down to really solid play defensively, creating turnovers. It is a punt return and a post. That’s what that game became. That’s how dangerous they are. Defensively, every play, they are going to have the possibly of going up and over the top to a big and fast receiver. We have to be very sound in that way. Every time the ball goes in the air when we punt, we have to be in position and cover with the right attitude, but also, the right structure to neutralize him, to limit him. He’s a good player. That’s a part of what makes him so dynamic and a part of what validates them as being a top team in the country is that you have really strong performance in all three phases.”

It seems like Sellers and Kyron Drones are similar types of quarterbacks. What defensive adjustments are you going to make between now and Saturday’s game?

“Everyone is a little different. The systems are different. Sellers has been a little more challenging when he’s been on the move. It seems like big play after big play when he’s able to extend and find targets down the field. You focus on the quarterback, but you also look at the system and how the system is built around the quarterback. Obviously, we expect to have to defend him in the run game, similar to what we had to do against Drones. Short yardage plays, plays in the red zone, or just designed formations. A lot of times, it will be empty backfields or the running back will lead for him, where they are going to try and get him going in the run game, too. Those are things that we will have to prepare for and hopefully, through our experience last weekend, tighten some of the systems down because I wasn’t thrilled with the way we functioned on third and one to three. I think the best way to eliminate that, because again, that is very challenging, is to not get into third and one or three. You talk about how you play on first and second down, how you contest space, how you change shells. That’s the challenge.

“I think the point of emphasis that I’ve made to our team, and particularly our defense, is that this is a game that our defensive line needs to win. That is where we have to set a tone. If we can’t do that, you’ll afford a really talented player time and space to make it hard on us. If you can win up front, you have a chance to erase some of those plays that become back-breakers as the game goes. Again, you look at last year, it’s 7-0 at half. They take possession. There was a negative yardage play. I think it was first and long to second and long, where we had him all but sacked. He actually ducks out of it, ducks out of the full body weight on him and finds a player behind our half-field safety that ends up going for 50 or 60 yards. That’s an example of how dynamic he can be. We have to finish at the point of attack. We have to crush the pocket. We have to understand where he escapes and how to vice him. In the open field, it can’t be one-on-one. There needs to be an outside player and inside player. We have to get the ball level. We cannot let him get to our sideline. Those are the things.”

South Carolina lost a lot of really great players to the NFL. What do you think of how it has replaced those guys?

“First of all, to their credit, they’ve developed players that are, you know, it wasn’t just NFL. I mean, those guys went earlier. There were a lot of really talented people. And then obviously, I think, just like we’re experiencing, you know, we were maybe just behind them, but there’s energy built around kind of what that program is becoming. So they’re able to go out, and people want to play there. So they’ve done a great job of that. And again, that’s a lot of what we’re working on. I went back, and I was in preparation for this morning, you know, I was watching parts of our 2021 game. And you want to talk about two totally different teams and two totally different programs. I mean, it is amazing how much has changed since the first time that we played, since I’ve been here, so it’s a credit to them. But again, we feel like we’ve done the same, and so it should be a really competitive game and a tough fight.”

South Carolina has some real stars, and we’ve asked your players about them. They talked about how they kind of want to focus on themselves as they head into the game, rather than the guys that they have. It seems like something that you’ve kind of trained them to do. Why is that a valuable mindset in your mind?

“I feel like so much of football, not even college football, is just like, do you control what you control? Do you actually channel yourself so you become a force of power on the field, rather than something that’s reacting? We want to dictate energy. The way you do that is you pay attention to yourself. Let me tell you, when they run the big post, when it’s really effective, is when you don’t have a post player. If we’re not in structure, if we’re not communicating the right way, you know, if we’re not on top of the route, then it’s going to be a touchdown. So let’s make sure that we’re controlling the things we control to make those plays hard. Same with the quarterback. We can talk what we want about him. He’s one player. There are 11 on each side of the ball. If our 11 guys are doing their job, we’re going to make it harder for him to find the space and find the plays. If we’re not, then obviously he becomes better for that.

“So the attention we will talk about is our four opponents. The first opponent is us. That’s the most important one. Once you get past us, it’s the game. And just like last weekend in Virginia Tech, you can’t chase emotions in the game. I mean, you can’t. You know your job is to predict. Ours is not. If we get in the habit of predicting during the game, then if it’s going well, we’ll feel like it’s won. If it’s not going well, we’ll feel like it’s lost. And those feelings are powerful with respect to the actions they manifest in. So we’re not predictors, we’re not projectors. We’re going to be in the moment, down by down, not chasing the emotions of the game. The third competitor is the environment that will be challenging, but that one is as challenging as you allow it to be, you know. And we try to flip that in our minds and know that it’s for us to understand operationally, how we need to work. And we hope to, again, water that down as we go, because we play well, how do we affect the environment? We focus on us. The last one is the team you’re playing against. And again, to me, that’s less about making them out to be, you know, anything other than just an opponent that runs these plays and these situations, and here’s how we anticipate, here’s how we get to our technique faster than them. Here are the ways that we’re going to neutralize what makes them good. Here are the ways that we’re going to emphasize the things that we feel like we have an advantage in all of that, all four of those.

“It always comes back to the first one; that is the only one that matters. Are we winning the battle with ourselves? Are we whole when we step on the field? Are we focused and energetic and spirited, and are we disciplined in the way we execute if we do those things? And, you know, again, my belief is that we can play with and beat any team in the country. The challenge is doing those things, and it’s hard for a 43-year-old to do that, you know what I mean? We have 18, I guess 18 to 25 now, or whatever it is. I don’t want to leave out older parts of our roster, but these guys take it to heart. And part of what you’re hearing in the message is the idea that they understand the significance of staying in the moment, staying within themselves, and doing their jobs with focus and execution.”

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