Don't look now, but the start of the college football season continues to loom ever closer.
This may be a hard concept for some of you to actually grasp, especially those among you who are currently swept up in the magic (heavy sarcasm) of the soccer extravaganza which is the World Cup, in all of its neck-biting and mind-numbing glory.
But there are certain tell-tale signs that the sport that the great majority of us love the most, and have endured many cold sweats and dizzying episodes of panic without during these past several cruel months, is about to once again take its rightful place at the forefront of the sports universe. These include the presence of various college football preview magazines at bookstores and newsstands everywhere, the annual invasion of coaches, players and fans to Hoover for SEC Media Days being about two weeks away and the fact that Steve Spurrier is once again taking little digs at other coaches or programs.
Anyone who has followed college football on a moderately regular basis is well aware that for that past two decades or so, the "ole ball coach" has seemingly generated as many headlines with some of his jabs at programs such as Tennessee (once noting that you cannot spell Citrus without UT whenever the Volunteers found themselves relegated to a lesser bowl such as the Citrus Bowl) and Florida State (referring to the Seminole program as Free Shoes University in relation to a 1994 scandal involving several of Bobby Bowden's players) as with his success at both Florida and South Carolina.
There have been occasions where some of Spurrier's shots have come off as fairly amusing, and that is one of the many reasons the veteran, visor-tossing coach has often been a darling of the media. Of course, however, at other times, Spurrier’s zingers have not played quite as well, and in fact have reduced the coach to sounding petty and a little vindictive. I would definitely place Spurrier’s latest mini-controversy in the petty category, with perhaps a little sour grapes and jealousy thrown in for good measure.
As you know by now, Spurrier aimed right for the top of the college football ladder for his latest attack as he basically insinuated that Alabama coach Nick Saban, who tops any current credible list as the nation’s top college football coach, and who has basically also secured his place in the pantheon of the best coaches of all-time, has somehow underachieved during his seven-year tenure at the Capstone.
Let’s see. During Saban’s coaching reign in Tuscaloosa, the Crimson Tide has captured three national championships while just falling short in a couple of those other seasons after being in serious national title contention during the majority of those seasons. Alabama has been a fixture in the polls under Saban and has spent many of those weeks as the nation’s No. 1 team. He has dominated the recruiting rankings like no coach ever has, bringing in several of the nation’s top classes to Tuscaloosa, and many analysts have stated that the incoming class is perhaps the best class ever assembled. In seemingly record speed, Saban turned a Crimson Tide program heading toward total irrelevancy into the gold standard of college football, and his three national championships in four years with the Crimson Tide (including the back-to-back titles in 2011 and 2012) have already secured Alabama’s place as one of the top college football dynasties of all time.
Apparently that record does not quite cut it with Spurrier, however, who said he feels that perhaps Saban has not “maxed out potentially as well as he could” due to the fact that the Tide coach, despite all of the talent that he has accumulated at UA, has only achieved two SEC titles. Of course it is never really surprising when the former Florida legend puts his foot into his ever smirking mouth, but the comments regarding Saban were over the top even for him, and probably would be considered quite comical if not so remarkably absurd. And this is coming from a coach who might actually want to look at the man in the mirror when it comes to underachievement.
There is no doubt about Spurrier’s place as one of the game’s greatest coaches, and he has definitely earned his legendary status in Gainesville, both as a player and a coach. I feel that what he has done at South Carolina is also remarkable as he turned the Gamecock program into a consistent power, both on the SEC and national level. This is doubly impressive at a school which has never been known as a huge football mecca, even with its share of legendary players and an overall great football atmosphere at Williams-Brice Stadium. But due to the nice coaching job done by Spurrier himself in Gainesville during his 12-year tenure, the overall expectations for the Gator program will always greatly surpass those of the South Carolina program and if you look at Spurrier’s time with the Gators, it is definitely a study in magic moments combined with plenty of missed opportunities as well.
In 12 seasons with the Gators, Florida captured six SEC titles, which is impossible to discount in terms of impressive conference supremacy, but it also should be noted that the SEC during Spurrier’s Florida tenure was very solid, but hardly the powerhouse that it has been in the course of the past 8 years (with the SEC having won 7 of the past 8 national titles and being only 13 seconds away from having captured the last 8 titles). Winning SEC titles is more difficult than ever now, and the fact that Alabama was able to gain the 2011 national title without even winning its own division only serves as testament to that fact. It is also fact that Alabama’s ability to beat a conference rival in the national title game that it had previously lost to during the regular season is one of the main reasons why we are finally having a college playoff this coming season, along with the SEC’s overall dominance during the past decade.
During that same period, however, Florida was only able to capture one national title, and no matter what the ball coach might have to say about the importance of taking home conference crowns, he established a program in Gainesville where national championship trophies had become a routine part of the expectation level. But despite the fact that the Gators are located in arguably the most talent-rich state in the nation, Spurrier has to be frustrated with the fact that Florida could only get it done one time on the national championship stage.
So being well aware of this fact, some might wonder why Spurrier would be inclined to criticize the record of the coach currently leading the nation’s top program.
I think jealousy may play a role in some of this as Saban is currently gaining all of the national acclaimed praise that Spurrier routinely received at Florida up until the time that he left his alma mater for a forgettable stint as coach of NFL’s Washington Redskins. I think Spurrier also realizes that his coaching days may be somewhat numbered and knows that his Gamecock program will never reach the plateau of success that Saban’s Crimson Tide has attained.
This may be reaching somewhat, but I think that sour grapes may also play into the equation somewhat as the Crimson Tide has been a true nemesis to Spurrier at times, especially during his time at Florida.
Spurrier actually dominated the Crimson Tide during his Florida days, topping Alabama several times in the SEC title game and also besting Bama in a couple of regular-season games during Gene Stallings’ tenure as coach of the Tide. He also gained a nice home win at South Carolina against Saban’s defending national champions in 2010. But it is probably the games in which his Gators fell short against the Crimson Tide that might actually still cause him to lose a bit of sleep on occasion.
Of course the inaugural version of the SEC’s title game in 1992, pitting Spurrier’s Gators against Stallings’Crimson Tide is considered one of the most important games in college football history, as the Gators were not only hoping to win the conference’s first title game at Birmingham’s Legion Field, but to also crush the national championship aspirations of an 11-0 Crimson Tide team. The rest of course is history with Alabama’s Antonio Langham providing the winning points with a pick six off of Florida quarterback Shane Matthews in a riveting 28-21 Alabama victory. That iconic Langham play may have translated into the most crushing defeat of Spurrier’s coaching career. Then flash forward to 1999, when Alabama ventured into The Swamp and ended Florida’s 30-game home winning streak with a breathtaking 40-39 overtime shocker. That same season, Alabama completed a two-game sweep of Spurrier’s team by drilling the Gators 34-7 in the SEC title game. I imagine the fact that a Tide team coached by Mike DuBose, basically a modern-day version of J.B. “Ears” Whitworth in theannals of Crimson Tide football, was able to knock of his Florida team not once but twice has to also be an irksome thing for Spurrier to have on his record.
Whether or not those stinging losses to the Crimson Tide have anything to do with Spurrier’s recent remarks regarding Saban is fun to ponder, and debatable at best. But I, for one, am not discounting the possibility anyway. At the end of the day, I think the ball coach should probably concentrate on improving his own legacy considering that he himself has fallen quite short in the one area that is most important for SEC schools who want to maintain football programs that are considered to be in the upper echelon category, and that is national championship rings. In fact, it might be nice for Spurrier to gain at least one SEC title at South Carolina before he continues to hurl hollow jabs at other very proven coaches.
