Swinney, Brownell embrace Tigers fans in Columbia

Dabo Swinney waited all the way through.

The line for photos Tuesday stretched through a large portion of the Jamil Shrine Temple in Columbia, with a professional photographer replacing fans’ iPhones to speed up the process. But Swinney, a national championship football coach who drew a four-figure crowd, greeted every fan with a smile, schmoozed and joked, until the line thinned out.

One woman came through two or three times, and the last go-round, he took note and seemed to call her on it. Moments later, they were taking another photo, this time with a friend who wasn’t in her first shot.

Swinney and men’s basketball coach Brad Brownell helped fill the temple for the stop on the Prowl & Growl tour. Athletics director Dan Radakovich was the first to point out the Tigers’ trio of wins against South Carolina in basketball, football and baseball, and Swinney admitted the Midlands stop was a little better with the winds of a rivalry win at his back.

“There’s always a little added juice, for sure when you come down here to Columbia,” Swinney said. “I’ve been down here with some losses. I sure like this side of it better. They smile at me a little bit more.”

Swinney joked to the crowd about getting a national champions freeway exit sign for Columbia.

He also said he enjoyed the process of starting over, adding his title team was a young squad. He talked about the challenge of re-teaching players, working with 18-year-olds after sending players on to bigger things.

He said, at this moment, Kelly Bryant at quarterback gives his team the best chance to win, and “it’s not even close.”

Brownell also spoke highly of coming to Columbia. He mentioned the chance to interact with fans who regularly make the two-hour trip up to the Upstate and praised basketball in the area.

His roster has had, and will continue to have, a Midlands flavor.

“There’s a lot of good players here,” Brownell said. “I think the basketball is improving in the state of South Carolina, and certainly Columbia, it’s improved a lot. We’ve got a young man coming in Clyde Trapp. We had a young man that just finished in Jordan Roper. And we’ve had a lot of other good players that come from this area.”

This story was originally published May 9, 2017 at 9:02 PM with the headline "Swinney, Brownell embrace Tigers fans in Columbia."