At any other point in the history of Vanderbilt football—with the exception of the program’s early 20th-century glory years—what Commodores coach Clark Lea said at the SEC’s spring meetings Tuesday would’ve seen him laughed off the stage. Maybe there were still a few chuckles Tuesday, not necessarily out of disrespect but out of future shock over how far Vanderbilt has come.“I didn’t come to Vanderbilt for a 10-win season,” Lea told those assembled via Pete Thamel of ESPN. “I came to win a national championship. I know we have ground to cover to do that.”Let that sink in. Every team in college football dreams of winning the national championship. The Commodores—once the SEC’s doormat—have developed enough where they can say it out loud and not sound crazy.Here are the three factors that have allowed Vanderbilt to at least consider raising the trophy at some point in the near future.1. Lea has helped Vanderbilt hurdle a number of longstanding program blocks—allowing the Commodores to imagine bigger thingsFreshman quarterback Jared Curtis is expected to be the heir apparent to the Vanderbilt quarterback left vacant by the program-changing Diego Pavia. | DENNY SIMMONS / THE TENNESSEAN / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images“You live in the wake of what you create. I’ve been up here as a two-win coach. I like being up here as a 10-win coach,” Lea said Tuesday.When Lea took the reins at Vanderbilt in 2020, the program was coming off an 0–9 season. It had never won more than nine games in its history, hadn’t cracked the AP top 10 since 1947, and hadn’t beaten Alabama since 1984.In 2024, led by quarterback Diego Pavia, the Commodores shocked the Crimson Tide 40–35 at home. While Vanderbilt finished just 7–6, its competitive nature supercharged the 2025 team’s confidence. The result: a 10–3 campaign—the Commodores’ first 10-win season ever—that saw Vanderbilt beat three top-15 teams and peak at No. 9.Every 10-game winner from the SEC in the past generation has been taken seriously the next year, and the Commodores should be no different. That would be true even if Vanderbilt didn’t land a seismic recruiting coup in quarterback Jared Curtis, who committed to play for Lea on Dec. 2.2. In the age of Indiana coach Curt Cignetti, no Power 4 team—and especially no Big Ten or SEC team—feels like a permanent also-ranThe advent of player compensation in college has—to a degree—created a rough long-term parity among Power 4 teams, and more specifically among teams in similar tiers (the Big Ten and SEC, the ACC and Big 12, and so on).Need proof? Indiana coach Curt Cignetti took charge at Indiana before the ’24 season, reached the CFP in year one, and won the national championship in year two. For Lea and the Commodores, the turnaround has taken longer but has been no less impactful. The Hoosiers and Vanderbilt both have spent their money wisely, paid close attention to culture, and reaped the rewards. If Indiana can go all the way, who’s to say the Commodores can’t?3. Nashville—an aspirational city to a certain strand of Gen Zer—has conferred an mild level of cool on Vanderbilt as a programLocation, location, location. College football is not an intrinsically urban game, but there have been a few moments in history where the stars aligned between a winning program and an “it” city. The Miami of 2 Live Crew, Hollywood and USC at multiple junctures (the 1920s, the 2000s), Atlanta with nearby Georgia in the mid-2010s.And so it has gone, to a lesser extent, with Nashville. The city is booming, as is its most visible industry—country music, which is enjoying the kind of chart success it hasn’t seen in decades. That boom has created an entire ecosystem of Nashville-adjacent entertainment personalities, and a few of those have taken to Commodores football in recent years, from comedian Nate Bargatze (a Nashville native and lifelong Vanderbilt supporter who’s mined his fandom for jokes) to podcaster and friend of Pavia Theo Von.This group isn’t exactly celebrity row at Knicks game, but they tend to be the types of people who carry weight with (or are at least recognizable to) teenagers in the South. Even if the Commodores’ top draws are Lea’s culture, their affluent booster base, and the university’s formidable academics, that kind of thing matters. Clout, even in this digital dark age, can’t be bought.More College Football From Sports IllustratedListen to SI’s college sports podcast, Others Receiving Votes, below or on Apple and Spotify. Watch the show on SI’s College YouTube channel.Add us as a preferred source on GoogleFollow