The road to success seems to be a long one for Vanderbilt, but head coach Clark Lea is willing to take time to fix the program.

While speaking at the 2022 SEC Media Days, Lea provided an update on Vanderbilt’s rebuilding process. One important part of his speech was that he named Mike Wright as the starting QB. Wright was a fixture in the offense late in the season when he started five of the last six games. He appeared in a total of 10 games in 2021.

As Wright approaches his junior season, he will be an integral part to Vanderbilt’s immediate future. Not only will Lea depend on Wright, but he will hope to build a strong culture in Nashville. Lea spoke about a long rebuild that started in 2021:

“Challenged on many levels, but we were not victimized by that adversity,” Lea said.

Lea further discussed having the right players in his program and he was able to weed out those who did not buy into the program’s beliefs. Despite a challenging first season, Lea has high hopes for his program. He hopes to turn Vanderbilt into the best program in the country:

“We know that in time Vanderbilt football will be the best program in the country. As I stated a year ago, there are no cheat codes, no shortcuts, no hacks that’ll allow this to happen over night. This is still about going the long, hard way. Independent of the trends and the headlines generating the most attention right now in college football,” Lea said.