Steve Spurrier, Lou Holtz in favor of SEC playing after Big Ten, Pac-12 decisions
A pair of former South Carolina football head coaches have spoken, and they’re in favor of college football being played this fall despite the coronavirus pandemic.
In the wake of the Big Ten and Pac-12 announcing Tuesday they would postpone all fall sports in hopes of playing in the spring, sportswriter Pat Dooley took to Twitter to say legendary coach Steve Spurrier had given him a call.
“Coach Spurrier called a few minutes ago. Said the SEC and ACC should just play their seasons and winners face off for national title because one conference was going to win it anyway,” Dooley wrote.
Spurrier previously told The State in mid-July that he was in favor of conferences and programs giving the fall season a shot.
“I don’t pretend to know what you’re going to do now,” Spurrier said then. “But I certainly hope we play. I certainly hope we try to play.”
Spurrier’s opinion is shared by another former Gamecock boss, Lou Holtz.
Holtz, who led USC from 1999 to 2004, has been particularly outspoken in his belief, taking to Fox News twice in the past several weeks to argue his case.
“I think they should play, but that’s my thing ... if you have an asthma problem or you’re a diabetic, absolutely, don’t play, but the rest of us? Let’s go play,” Holtz said on Wednesday. “We shut everything down for six months. I’m going crazy if I’m being quarantined. Other people are tired of it. Let’s move on with our life. When they stormed Normandy, they knew there would casualties and there would be risks.”
Holtz’s reference to the risks of D-Day is not new — he made the same argument back in July, also on Fox News.
“People stormed Normandy,” Holtz said, per USA Today. “They knew there was going to be casualties, they knew there was gonna be risk. ... It’s our way of living, look at it from both points of view. The risk is always there. But you cannot just look at it from one side.”
That line of thinking has generated criticism on social media, according to the Miami Herald.
At the moment, South Carolina and the SEC are still working toward a 10-game, conference-only season, kicking off Sept. 26. Conference commissioner Greg Sankey released a statement Wednesday evening saying he will confer with the Big Ten and the Pac-12 about their reasons for canceling but that at the moment, he is still “comfortable with the thorough and deliberate approach that the SEC and our 14 members are taking to support a healthy environment for our student-athletes.”
South Carolina athletic director Ray Tanner, speaking on 107.5 FM on Tuesday afternoon, also said that the Big Ten’s decision won’t force South Carolina or the SEC to cancel.
South Carolina’s current head coach, Will Muschamp, retweeted Sankey’s statement on Tuesday. Speaking with reporters last week, he also expressed support for student-athletes being on campus, saying it was the safest place for them to be.
