Leave it to the old ball coach to give Tim Tebow a new source of motivation for beating the crap out of the rest of the SEC. And while you’re at it, lay the points.
South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier made news last week when it was revealed that he was the lone coach from the SEC who failed to vote for Florida’s two-time national champion and Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback on the conference’s first-team ballot.
So, if you liked the Gators last year when they thumped South Carolina 56-6 in the Swamp, you’re going to love them even more this season when they face the Gamecocks in a Nov. 14 road tilt.
For a guy who once thought leaving Florida (+300 at www.bookmaker.com to repeat as national champion) for the Washington Redskins was a good idea, and whose Gamecocks were drilled 56-6 last year by Tebow’s Gators, you might have thought Spurrier, by now, would have a better grasp of what was in his best interests.
Evidently, he doesn’t. There’s an irony to Spurrier’s scenic round-trip in the SEC that saw him go from mastermind of an unstoppable offense at Florida, to leading a South Carolina club that is noted for its solid defense, but panned for its inability to score with the conference’s elite clubs.
Like Florida.
As if the Gamecocks didn’t already have enough problems … now this. After news broke that one SEC coach failed to list Tebow on the first team, the media broke out in a frenzied search of the unwise culprit.
It didn’t take long for every SEC coach to claim innocence except Spurrier, who had to take a few minutes to get his story straight before coming clean. Then, the old, head ball coach claimed he let the director of football operations fill out his ballot, which he then signed without looking at it.
Which seems a plausible excuse before you realize …a) no way it happened, b) why would the Director Of Operations for Football at the University of South Carolina, or DOOFUS for short, be allowed to fill out the ballot and, c) why type of DOOFUS would pick Jevan Snead of Ole Miss ahead of Tebow?
One who is a glutton for punishment, is the best we can guess. Tebow and the Gators were going to slaughter South Carolina regardless, but now you can count on a real merciless-variety whipping.
Keep in mind that whenever a Tebow-led Florida club has been disrespected by an opponent, he ensures that they pay dearly. For instance, Hawaii was first on the guillotine last season after former coach June Jones had suggested Colt Brennan was a better quarterback than Tebow, whom he described as the product of a gimmicky system and offense.
Florida 56, Hawaii 10.
Then, there was the annual rivalry game with Georgia in the World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party (which has to be the greatest nickname ever for a sporting event), in which Tebow had a score to settle. The previous year, the Bulldogs had embarrassed Florida when the whole team rushed the field after Georgia scored the first touchdown. Tebow and friends remembered.
Florida 49, Georgia 10.
So when the news broke of Spurrier’s snub of Tebow, you had to think he must be looking to hasten his exit from South Carolina – evidently he didn’t try hard enough last year — and head back to the beckoning golf courses he so fancies.
He could have saved Tebow and the rest of the trouble and just resigned.
