You said verbatim "Much like Purdue...not worth the paper..." There is 0 evidence that is the case, and plenty of evidence otherwise, which I already listed.

I don't think Vandy is really better than ND, even though they rank slightly higher. They're more peer institutions than one clearly over the other. Their athletes get a similar treatment to ND.

ND is unusual but not unique in having elite academics and elite athletics. Vandy suffers from being in the SEC for football, but is a very good school (that US News ranks higher than ND). They also treat athletes pretty similar to ND.

I brought up Wood and Shembo because, you know, rocks in glass houses.