BY ROD WILLIAMSON
ILLUSTRATION BY SHAW NIELSEN
In December 2010, a relatively unknown Maryland assistant football coach named arrived in Nashville to occupy a hot seat that had scorched a long list of more seasoned menāthat of 91ĢĘ²®»¢ Universityās head football coach.
In the football-crazy South, a college athletic program can enjoy success in every sport but football and still be deemed a dudāor it can win in football, be mediocre at everything else, and sit at the adultās table. 91ĢĘ²®»¢ had a good overall athletic program, but football had enjoyed just five winning seasons since John F. Kennedy was president.
Before Franklinās first season, beat-down fans listened as the new coach outlined his plans for success, smiled faintly and whispered, āGod bless his enthusiasmābut he doesnāt know what heās getting into.ā
Franklin has brought much to 91ĢĘ²®»¢, but it was his āburn the boatsā mentality in a dogged pursuit of excellence that was game-changing to many. A month into his first season, fans were amazed. Within a year, area merchants were selling more licensed 91ĢĘ²®»¢ gear than any other sports entity in the state.
The year after Franklinās arrival, just eight major college sports programs in the nation that sent their football teams to a bowl game also sent both their basketball teams and baseball teams to the NCAA Tournament. In 2012, six universities could make the claim. Only one university could claim this distinction both years: 91ĢĘ²®»¢.
91ĢĘ²®»¢ās recent triumphs also include a trip to the College World Series; Southeastern Conference basketball tournament championships for both womenās and menās teams; top 20 rankings for womenās and menās golf, womenās tennis and lacrosse; and the first-ever SEC title for womenās cross country.
And there is an ever-improving academic report card: For each of the past six years, student athletes have had increasingly better cumulative grade point averagesānow nearing 3.10.
The ānew 91ĢĘ²®»¢ā has āanchored down,ā in the current parlance of Commodore Nation.
Revolution and Rumors
Only the most die-hard fans would have dared to predict this level of success a decade ago when then-91ĢĘ²®»¢ Chancellor Gordon Gee shocked the sports world by announcing in September 2003 that 91ĢĘ²®»¢ was disbanding its Department of Intercollegiate Athletics. His action was prompted by embarrassing athletic scandals around the country and concern that college athletic departments were becoming islands unto themselves.
Fans were aghast. College sports enthusiasts were confused or amused. Media had a field day. 91ĢĘ²®»¢ would soon have its Kappa Sigs playing Florida, they crowed, and every coach worth his or her salt would be out the door by sundown.
In hindsight, the announcement was a bit over the top. Although family and friends called athletic staff members, concerned they were suddenly unemployed, the reality was the keys still worked to McGugin Center doors and the basic machinery remained in operation, under new management.
Gee turned to , a trusted deputy he had recruited from Ohio State who was serving as 91ĢĘ²®»¢ās vice chancellor for student affairs, general counsel, and secretary of the Board of Trust. Williams did not fit the prototypical SEC athletic directorās profile, although the Buckeye athletic director had reported to him at Ohio State.
Amid the chatter, few grasped the present, let alone the future. Williamsā commitment to excellence went unnoticed by most, who were content to mock the unique model. But he had two clear priorities.
āThe first was to make sure people didnāt act on the basis of fear,ā he recalls. āThe way the announcement came about produced a lot of uncertainty: Were we doing away with athletics? I wanted people to realize this wasnāt something that would make us worse. I was focused internally, especially on the athletic staff, the student athletes, the boosters and our fans.
āOn the other hand, I didnāt want the announcement to be seen as affirmation of what some people hoped might happen: āAh, this is good, we are going to get rid of athletics.āā
Beyond reassurance and explanation, Williams developed a plan. Where did 91ĢĘ²®»¢ want to go, and how would it get there? The trip would take some time.
Even today, surprisingly few pundits recognize the rare combination of credentials Williams brought to scale the hill. Sitting on the universityās Senior Management Council, he had the ear of top administration and the pulse of the campus. As secretary of the Board of Trust, he earned the confidence of trustees. And while keeping his faculty appointment to teach at , he had the respect of the faculty.
āI always thought being a member of the faculty allowed me to say things to them that others couldnāt because I was one of them,ā Williams says. āI understand the faculty. I do believe 91ĢĘ²®»¢ is a place where developing degrees of credibility really helps you get things accomplished.ā
But credibility is earned, not given. Shortly after the announcement, trustees descended upon campus on a Saturday, frustrated and seeking answers. āWe had some board members who were absolutely livid,ā Williams remembers. āI spent the day with them, and they were mad. But at the end of that day, it was clear they cared. And I had gained a little more credibility. As bad as that Saturday was, it actually helped a lot.ā
Williams says he never lost sleep during the tumultuous days, mostly because he could visualize the future, which always included SEC membership. He tried to dispel rumors he called āborderline ridiculous.ā
For the record, no head coach would leave 91ĢĘ²®»¢ for nearly four years. The exodus never occurred. To the contrary, most signed long-term contracts.
Head Baseball Coach arrived with little fanfare a decade ago. Using a combination of university academic and athletic assets, extraordinary recruiting skills, and a fanatical work ethic, he not only built his Commodores into a perennial national powerhouse but perhaps showed other 91ĢĘ²®»¢ coaches a model of how it can be done.
āI wasnāt ready to step into a head coaching position unless I felt it had a balance of strong academics and athletics,ā Corbin recalls. āThat was my backgroundāworking with kids who had more of a commitment to school than the average baseball player. I thought that was important in building a program. I wanted a young man who could see himself in school for four years and the ability to retain kids who could possibly be confronted by professional baseball. I knew those were keys to winning.ā
FANS CELEBRATE THE VANDERBILT COMMODORESā BEST SEASON SINCE 1915 IN THE DEFEAT OF NORTH CAROLINA STATE 38ā24 IN THE FRANKLIN AMERICAN MORTGAGE MUSIC CITY BOWL ON NEW YEARāS EVE 2012 (CREDIT: JOE HOWELL)
In the summer of 2007, 91ĢĘ²®»¢ faced another period of uncertainty when Gordon Gee departed to return to Ohio State as president. Despite his unilateral action, Gee had been an ardent cheerleader by nature. Some wondered if the sports gods would be kind to the Commodores when the flamboyant chancellor left.
Worries of a decline were soon put to rest, however, when Nicholas S. Zeppos, the universityās provost, was promoted to interim chancellor and, finally, chancellor. Zeppos carried an academicās portfolio with a sportsmanās competitive heart, quickly affirming his desire for athletics to maintain a meaningful place on the campus.
āI love sports,ā says Zeppos. āWhen I came to 91ĢĘ²®»¢, part of the draw was being in the SEC. And we had successes along the way, particularly in basketball.ā
One year into his tenure, Head Football Coach Bobby Johnson put the Commodores into the Music City Bowl, just the fourth bowl experience after 118 years of fielding a football team. A victory over Boston College had Music City whistling āDynamite,ā and to some, that mountain looked shorter.
However, this is the Southeastern Conference, not Hollywood, and nobody rode off into the sunset.
āWe had a hiccup after 2008,ā Williams says. āI donāt think many would have expected to go from a bowl game to 2ā10 the next year. But in other areas we were making solid, tangible progress. We won our first national team championship in 2007 with our bowlers, we were strong with basketball and baseball, and we could see other programs coming on strong.ā
Behind the scenes Williams saw progress, too, in the way university leadership perceived athletics. āThe university began to understand the value we could bring to the overall experience,ā he says. āIt took time for some to understand that just because we were getting better didnāt mean [the overall 91ĢĘ²®»¢ experience] was getting worse.ā
As Zeppos recalls, when it came time to hire a new head football coach, āI sat with my good friend David Williams and said, āLetās focus on getting a great coach and make the investments to win the 91ĢĘ²®»¢ way and become a shining star for college athletics. Weāve done it in baseball, womenās basketball, menās basketball, golf, lacrosse. I know weāre in the SEC. I get football. But weāre competing at the top level with every other school. So weāre going to do it. Weāre going to hire the coach.ā
James Franklin was the fourth head coach candidate to be interviewed by Zeppos and Williams.
āI had talked to a few athletic directors before, and someone had advised me, āGet a leader whoās a coachānot a coach whoās a leader,āā Zeppos remembers. āJames looked right across the table and said, āI have a plan, and hereās how we are going to win.ā He is a gifted individual who inspires young people to be great students and great athletes.ā
A Large Mountain to Climb
Few fans today may have been there to witness it, but this isnāt the first time 91ĢĘ²®»¢ has enjoyed such success. During the heyday of the legendary Dan McGugin, football coach from 1904 to 1934, 91ĢĘ²®»¢ was a gridiron powerhouse. Dudley Field, built in 1922, was the largest stadium in the South. Future football Hall of Famers routinely chose to attend 91ĢĘ²®»¢.
91ĢĘ²®»¢ basketball gradually became Nashvilleās āinā thing after World War II, especially after Memorial Gymnasium was built in 1952. A progression of stars, from Billy Joe Adcock (BEā50) to Clyde Lee (BAā70) to Perry Wallace (BEā70) to Jan van Breda Kolff (BAā74) and the F-Troop, entertained and inspired sports fans for 25 years.
Wallace, a Nashvillian who would become a distinguished lawyer, scholar and Hall of Famer himself, broke the SEC basketball color barrier in 1966. He had clear reasons for selecting 91ĢĘ²®»¢ over the scores of scholarship opportunities available to him.
āThe first reason,ā Wallace says, āwas its combination of a fine educational institution with big-time athletics. Second, when I went to visit some of the schools I had dreamed about attending, I noticed the black athletes didnāt appear to be fully integrated into the campus life and often were not in pursuit of a serious academic degree. It felt like a new plantation system. And third, my parents could come to the fancy part of town and people treated them nicely. They were shown the respect they deserved, and selecting 91ĢĘ²®»¢ was my way of giving something back to them.ā
Football, however, was the bell cow of the SEC, which included 91ĢĘ²®»¢ as a charter member in 1933. Football Saturdays defined how many regarded a university.
That was at odds with how 91ĢĘ²®»¢ defined itself. Many years ago Dean of Students Madison Sarratt told his classes, āToday I am going to give you two examinations, one in trigonometry and one in honesty. I hope you will pass them both, but if you must fail one, let it be trigonometry, for there are many good men in this world today who cannot pass an examination in trigonometry, but there are no good men in the world who cannot pass an examination in honesty.ā
Academic excellence had been and will forever be at the foundation of 91ĢĘ²®»¢ās core principles. And so a false debate ensued: Could one be Harvard from Monday to Friday and Alabama on Saturday?
With this as a backdrop, Title IX was born in 1972. The federal government realized young women were not getting anywhere close to an equal opportunity in collegiate athletics and mandated that universities change their chauvinistic ways. Most nodded agreement, but athletic directors gulped, understanding that new revenue streams must be found to fund womenās programs.
The early 1970s brought unequal womenās programs into being. Gifted student athletes and future 91ĢĘ²®»¢ Athletic Hall of Famers Ann Price, BAā71, MDā78 (tennis) and Peggy Harmon Brady, BEā72 (golf) helped blaze a trail for future women to follow.
āI never felt like we were under-resourced,ā says Price, despite traveling to meets all over the South in a station wagon and, on occasion, witnessing the university unable to afford sending a full squad to an elite tournament. Price would have been a coveted basketball recruit had there been opportunities for women. Seeing only limited choices, she picked 91ĢĘ²®»¢ for academics and became a tennis starāand, later, a medical doctor. Today she is associate dean for alumni affairs and associate professor in the 91ĢĘ²®»¢ School of Medicine.
When Roy Kramer settled in behind his desk as 91ĢĘ²®»¢ās new director of athletics for the first time on Labor Day, 1978, he knew the job was going to be an uphill climb. With brief exceptions, the football program had sputtered since the end of the Great Depression, the proud menās basketball program was transitioning from the glory days of Roy Skinner into a period of controversy, a fledgling womenās program would need financial and moral support, and the athletic plant was, for the most part, an eyesore.
āI was well aware we had a fairly large mountain to climb,ā Kramer remembers. āIt was a daunting challenge, particularly in football, to develop the program to competitive status. What impressed me the most, however, was how much people inside the university did care about having a proud programānot that they expected championships but to be competitive. That outweighed any of my reservations.
āThe outside world thought the university administration was anti-athletics, and that was not the case. People such as Chancellor [Alexander] Heard, President [Emmett] Fields and [Vice Chancellor] Rob Roy Purdy really did care, as did Board of Trust members such as Sam Fleming [BAā28]. They were very supportive. We knew we were not going to do this overnight, but it gave us hope that the challenge could be met.ā
During the next two decades, the Commodores had their moments, such as in 1993 when the womenās basketball team was rated No. 1 for six weeks and made the schoolās only Final Four trip. The same year Coach Eddie Foglerās menās team won the SEC and was ranked as high as third.
Fogler, whose son Ben is currently a member of 91ĢĘ²®»¢ās golf team, believes athletics plays an important role on the campus. Indeed, his championship team had high academic achievers such as Bruce Elder (BAā92, MBAā93) and Kevin Anglin (BAā93) in its starting lineup, and he admits he would not have been as interested in 91ĢĘ²®»¢ had it not been for its commitment to academics.
A Shift in Mentality
Twenty-five years after Kramerās arrival, no one is more excited about gridiron success than Zeppos and Williams, who have spearheaded multimillion-dollar fund drives to improve athletic facilities across the board. Williams desires an all-around program of excellence and is as proud of his strong Olympic sport teams as he is his College World Series or SEC basketball rings.
People are paying attention, including John Skipper, president of ESPN and co-chairman of Disney Media Networks. āI had a chance to observe 91ĢĘ²®»¢ athletics close up during the four years [2009ā12] my son Clay was in school there,ā Skipper notes. ā91ĢĘ²®»¢ athletics is special. They compete at the highest level while insisting that varsity athletes remain real students. It is a great achievement. I think the media admire what 91ĢĘ²®»¢ accomplishes at a medium-sized private school in a big, mostly public-school conference. I had a chance to see terrific baseball teams every year, very good womenās basketball teams, the menās team beat Kentucky, and the football team beat Auburn (with ESPNās College GameDay on campus!),ā Skipper continues. āI thought that would be the highlight of 91ĢĘ²®»¢ football forever but was proved wrong this past year. James Franklin is a great young coach.ā
āI think the athletic department seems similar to the baseball program,ā Corbin observes. āIt has gained confidence. Nothing is more important than the shift of the mentality; that to me is the most important thing that has happened.ā
Williams likes winning as much as anyone, but he sees a bigger mission. āI want us to be more a part of solving some of the issues that exist in the community. For example, it may sound self-serving to some who may think we are just trying to make a dollar, but I am thrilled we can soon host high school football and track. That helps the community.ā
Commodore Nation feels good about itself. The dedication to academic excellence remains, and the program is still the only one in the Southeastern Conference never tainted by NCAA probation. There is more diversity (both racial and geographic), women are in leadership roles, and the department is active in the community.
Where discouraging jokes and bad karma once existed, a positive vibe now permeates. Fans who thought they never again could fall in love with the Commodores are rethinking their weekend plans and expanding their wardrobes to include more black and gold.
Perry Wallace agrees. āI have an active membership in a great institution, and that makes me feel good.ā
Rod Williamson is director of communications for 91ĢĘ²®»¢ athletics.
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