Nashville, TENN--Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea's team is intent on being different.
Lea's fourth team is out to prove that its intentions are aligned with their actions, too. It wants to rewrite the script when it comes to a Vanderbilt football program that's had its fair share of disappointment.
"Everybody always doubts Vanderbilt," Vanderbilt linebacker Bryan Longwell said. "Nobody ever thinks that Vandy is anything dangerous. Everybody always underestimates us...we are a football school. We are a good team and we're not the bottom feeders of the SEC."
Sentiments like that are often heard around McGugin Center, but not like this. Not with results to back them. Not with the confidence that Longwell says it with.
That confidence is result of a mentality that ultimately comes from Longwell's head coach, who feels as if he's been doubted just as much as his under-recruited players.
"I’m excited about that and that mentality is something that I share with them, too," Lea said of the team's chip. "I think anytime you kinda see your personality and your imprint in the team’s personality and the team’s attitude that’s a good thing."
Lea believes a role like he possesses comes with an inherent level of motivation. He's got what people call an 'impossible job,' he's having to fight his program's past and he's having to fight doubt.
Vanderbilt's quarterback has taken notice of that and has fed off of it.
"A lot of people doubt him too, whether he can do it or not," Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia said of Lea "Me and him share a common ground of that chip on our shoulder every single week, we've got to go out and do it."
That doubt hasn't come from within his program this season like it has in the past, though. It feels as if Vanderbilt's players have a unified message; they believe and they want to prove why they do.
"A lot of tweets and stuff and negative energy going out, we don’t really give into it," Vanderbilt corner Martel Hight said. "Just knowing that people doubt us a lot we take that and we just carry that as momentum."
Vanderbilt doesn't just have talk of progress now. It has serious, tangible momentum.
It's also riding a high after the first shutout of Lea's tenure.
Lea doesn't want that high to end, either. He wants substantial progress and a new story as a result of it.
“We want to prove ourselves, We want to take advantage of the moment," Lea said. "We are in a prove it mindset right now. I’ve got a bunch of hungry competitors in here that are, quite frankly, ready to rewrite the narrative."
