What Clark Lea Said About Vanderbilt Football’s Defense After the First Scrimmage – Sports Illustrated

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NASHVILLE – Following Vanderbilt football’s first scrimmage of fall camp, Vanderbilt head coach Clark Lea seemed to be thinking a mixed bag of thoughts on how his defense looked in the scrimmage.
While the Vanderbilt defense has done a nice job in multiple facets throughout camp thus far, Lea seemed to think that what he saw from his defense on the turf of FirstBank Stadium could have been better in some areas.
Lea overall has been pleased with what he has seen from his guys on defense throughout camp. But in Saturday’s scrimmage, though, Lea thought he had seen better from the defensive play on the outside. Lea felt his defense made the rushing plays that went to the outside too easy for the offense. While the offense did do good things on those plays, the defensive execution on defending those runs was not up to par for Lea.
“We have to be better on the perimeter. I thought the offense always had a four to six-yard gain on the perimeter. So, we’re not playing behind fence posts. We have got to be able to compress the block and stop the momentum of the running backs,” Lea said. “Those can easily be negative yard plays. Credit the offense and credit the blocking on the perimeter.”
In his press conference, Lea gave a shoutout to Vanderbilt running back Evan Hampton for his performance in the scrimmage. The scrimmage was easily Hampton’s best day of camp and he was part of what was causing Vanderbilt defensive fits on the perimeter.
In coverage, Vanderbilt looked like it played solid overall. Lea and his coaching staff probably would have liked to see his cornerbacks not allow pass catchers to get past them as often, but he likes where his secondary is overall when it comes to how his corners and safeties have looked in coverage.
“We are playing better in coverage. We are stickier in coverage. We’ll always be multiple and I like what Steve [Vanderbilt defensive coordinator Steve Gregory] has done with his pressure designs. I think it’s going to create challenges and so I think we’ve got to continue to progress that way,” Lea said.
A reason why Lea is pleased with what he has seen out of his defense is due to the impact it has had on the quarterbacks on the roster. Vanderbilt is not waiting until the season to challenge Jared Curtis or Blaze Berlowitz. Gregory has been scheming ways for his defense to disrupt Curtis and Berlowitz in practice as much as he can.
A result of that, of course, is the development it brings to the quarterbacks. The various defensive looks Vanderbilt brings is meant for the growth of the quarterbacks so that they are not surprised when they see varying defensive sets in a real game this fall.
As a defensive head coach, Lea has liked the idea of drawing up defensive pressure to challenge Curtis and Berlowitz. It is easy to make them look good when there is a clean pocket in practice, but Vanderbilt knows that is not how the game of football actually works.
“The quarterbacks benefit from it because they’re not going to see much in games that they haven’t already seen in practice. As you get to a game plan, you start to streamline looks and get specific about where the play lies. So I think we’ll be equipped for that,” Lea said.
There were some good things in the scrimmage and there were areas that need to be improved going forward. Luckily, there are still two weeks left to go in fall camp and Vanderbilt will be sure to use all that time wisely.
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Graham Baakko is a writer for Vanderbilt Commodores On SI, primarily covering football, basketball and baseball. Graham is a recent graduate from the University of Alabama, where he wrote for The Crimson White, WVUA-FM, WVUA 23 as he covered a variety of Crimson Tide sports. He also covered South Carolina athletics as a sportswriting intern for GamecockCentral.
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