Bob Jones Alum Candice Storey Lee Opening ‘Dores’ to Finance

When Bob Jones High School’s Candice Storey signed a basketball scholarship with Vanderbilt University, she figured to move on from Nashville once her eligibility was exhausted and her degree was secured.

After all, relocating was a way of life in a military family. She attended 12 schools before entering the ninth grade at Bob Jones.

“I had moved so much that when I came to Nashville, I think my initial thought was I’ll be here for four years and then I’ll head back home because like every four or five years or so that’s what we did, we moved,’’ she said.

It didn’t turn out that way.

Storey Lee has called Nashville home since she arrived in 1996, joining the athletic department in various positions after her playing days plagued by knee injuries were over.

She’s earned three degrees from Vanderbilt, including a master’s and a doctorate in higher education administration, and is also making history.

In early February 2020, she was named the school’s first female athletic director as well as the first black woman to hold that position at a Southeastern Conference school.

That was on an interim basis. She was later named to the job full-time on May 21, 2020. In addition to her AD role, Storey Lee also holds the title of vice chancellor for athletics and university affairs.

“Instead (of moving on), I pleasantly found a place where I could put down my own roots and it just felt perfect, it feels perfect, and in so many ways’’ said Storey Lee, who had risen to associate AD in 2016 on her way to the top job. “I’m not far from my (parents, retired in Madison). I am in a city that I love, I get to be at my alma mater and it’s just like it’s a dream come true and, no, I did not imagine that would be the case.’’

When Storey Lee was named AD she joined Virginia’s Carla Williams as the only two black women running athletic departments at Power Five schools. That number grew to three when Nina Duke was recently named AD at Duke.

Storey Lee has been busy since moving into her role.

She made head coaching changes in football and women’s basketball and the pandemic began shortly before she took over. She said navigating the virus to keep student-athletes safe has been her biggest challenge, so far.

Though a longtime Commodore, she also felt some pressure of the unknown.

“When you’re inheriting a role, you’re just trying to find your footing and be your authentic self and learn the environment,’’ she said. “I know that that may sound silly, being that I’ve been at Vanderbilt so long, but I was really intentional about not stepping into the role and assuming that I knew everything I needed to.’’

As a player, Storey Lee earned SEC All-Academic honors and earned four basketball letters but it took six years to get them. She redshirted as a freshman and, during her redshirt senior season, she had another in a string of knee injuries and sat out.

Then-Vandy Coach Jim Foster, and the school successfully petitioned the NCAA for a sixth season. When his former player was named AD, he told the Nashville Ledger she was more than capable of handling problems with aging facilities and dwindling attendance.

“If there is, in fact, turmoil and if, in fact, there are problems that need to be solved, the perfect person is now in position to start doing that,” Foster said.

Those issues have been addressed.

Vanderbilt’s first-of-its-kind for the university Vandy United Fund was announced in March — a $300 million commitment to upgrade facilities and operations. The school has already earmarked $100 million for the project and $100 million has been raised through donors.

The Commodores are renovating existing facilities, building new ones and “adding resources for all of our teams,’’ Storey Lee said.

Among the upgrades are a Football Operations Center, with soon-to-be renovated locker rooms; an indoor football practice field; a Sports Performance Center added to an expanded McGuin Center; a Basketball Operations Center and upgraded amenities at sports venues for the fans.

The football locker rooms should be ready for this season and other projects are expected to begin early in 2022.

Vanderbilt is unique in that it’s the lone SEC private school. It is also its smallest and the only one in a major city. It’s also the highest rated academic institution in the league and among the tops nationally.

Storey Lee says those things, along with the economic infusion, make Vandy an attractive option.

“I was attracted to Vanderbilt because I thought it offered the best of both worlds,’’ she said. “And I still think that, right?’’