Brain Bowl: Wake Forest And Vanderbilt Think Ahead to Saturday’s Mind Games

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You won’t find — not in any of the 400 or so college football games being played this Saturday — players representing two more academically prestigious institutions of higher learning than Wake Forest University versus Vanderbilt University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

These two institutions rank in the top 10 percent of 443 “Best National Universities,” according to the latest U.S. News & World Report assessments of colleges and universities across the United States. The ranking is based on 17 measures including quality of students, professors, and education along with expert opinions. What’s more, both schools rank in the top 1 percent academically of an estimated 6,000 colleges.

At both of these academically prestigious institutions, the average Scholastic Aptitude Test of incoming freshmen is some 400 points higher than the national average. Consistent with this, at these two universities the average American College Testing score is 11-16 points higher (ranging from 30 to 35) than the national average of 19.

Not surprisingly, these high academic standards have produced plenty of high-achieving graduates. Combined, Wake Forest and Vanderbilt have had 43 of their students earn Rhodes Scholarships. This scholarship is higher education’s most revered and competitive blending academic, athletic, and all-around student honor awarded.

Given all this academic horsepower, it’s also not surprising the coaches of these two teams show impressive intellectual acumen in how they lead their teams and express their ideas. Wake Forest coach Dave Clawson, a graduate of one of America’s best institutions of higher learning, Williams College, and who also earned a master’s degree, often talks about his love of reading books. His press conferences and interviews are more like life lesson sessions and state-of-the-world philosophical discussions than the predictable X and O coach banter.

Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea, who coached under Clawson at Wake Forest in 2016, uses words such as “fruition and actualize” in interviews – not words you hear college football coaches throw out much. He earned his undergraduate and graduate degrees from Vanderbilt.

Last season Vanderbilt’s football team earned the nation’s Annual Academic Award from the American Football Coaches for its 100 percent player graduation rate. In sync with this, Wake Forest is the only school in the country to score at least a 990 on the latest Academic Progress Report, Graduation Success Rate. This success rate reveals the proportion of student-athletes who earn a college degree.

On Saturday at Allegacy Field, you’ll see two well-educated, cerebral, and articulate men coaching many of the most intelligent college football players in America. Collectively, all of them represent two of America’s most important and credible institutions of higher learning. These are two football programs, unlike almost all others. A unique football game this will be – a battle of bright brains as much as brawn.

As you’re well aware, college football has suddenly become a blatant money grab by just about everybody involved. But at least on Saturday, we’ll be able to celebrate well-educated student-athletes who compete against outstanding students in the classroom. A welcome diversion this will be from the unprecedented upheaval now enveloping college football that has little to do with what’s most important: educating young men to use their brains to contribute more to society once their football careers are over.

This will be refreshing, intriguing, and inspiring.