Clark Lea on Wake Forest’s offense
Vanderbilt enters their Week 2 matchup against Wake Forest coming off back-to-back victories over Hawaii (63-10) and Elon (42-31). Head coach Clark Lea addressed the media Tuesday, discussing the Deacons’ RPO offense.
Lea spent a year in 2016 as the linebackers’ coach at Wake, facing the Deacs’ slow-mesh daily in practice. He spoke at length about coordinator Warren Ruggiero’s high-octane offense, which averaged 41 points per game a year ago.
“Wake Forest is all about explosive plays and scoring points,” Lea said. “It’s not that their explosive plays only come in the passing game, either. It’s this unique style of holding the ball in the mesh that gives them the opportunity to do that. When you’re reckless with this offense, they end up in the end zone.”
Lea has a thorough understanding of what makes the Wake Forest offensive attack so unique. The tempo of the mesh causes defenders to hesitate, and the running backs have the patience to exploit that when given delayed handoffs.
“The minute you pull a defender in to fit the run, they’re going to attack the vacated space with a throw. That’s what they do. And they do it really well. It’s an abnormal approach. And Warren does a great job of designing off of that base scheme.”
It was revealed yesterday that Wake Forest QB Sam Hartman will return to action after undergoing surgery for a blood clot. To Lea, however, the Wake Forest offense is dangerous no matter who’s under center.
“From what I’ve known, this is a system,” Lea said. “It seems like anyone they put back at quarterback has found success and rhythm in the system. To me, the focus is on defending the system.”
This is Clark Lea’s second year as the head man for the Commodores. After his one year stint in Winston-Salem, Lea coached the linebackers at Notre Dame, before being promoted to defensive coordinator. Lea last prepared to defend the Wake RPO in September of 2018, when Fighting Irish beat the Deacs 56-27,
Kickoff is at noon on Saturday at FirstBank Stadium in Nashville.
Ben is a managing editor and lead contributing writer for Deacons Daily. Ben has a year of experience as the Sports Editor for the Old Gold & Black, and a year of experience as the publication’s print managing editor. He has a journalistic profile of over 40 published news and sports pieces for the Dayton Daily News.