Steve Spurrier
Steve Spurrier
Stephen Orr Spurrieris a former American football player and coach, having served as the head coach of three college and two professional teams. Spurrier was also noteworthy as a standout college football player, and he spent a decade playing professionally in the National Football League. Spurrier retired from coaching in 2015 and now serves as an ambassador and consultant for the University of Florida's athletic department...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth20 April 1945
CountryUnited States of America
I salute and praise the people in Shreveport for having this bowl for 30 years. I know it's not always easy keeping these things alive, but I think the Independence Bowl is the 11th-oldest bowl in the country, so they have done a super job here.
To finish second in the SEC East is a wonderful season for our team. Obviously, we were not picked that high. To qualify for a bowl game, that was our big goal for our team. We felt it was achievable and realistic and our guys went out and won seven games to go to the bowl game.
Being a bowl team is a wonderful achievement for so many teams, and if you look at the history of the University of South Carolina, a bowl game is pretty good.
He's still on my team. Because I might would've done the same thing as a college kid when somebody took the bowl game away. ... You get mad and you get over it. Those guys, I don't really have a problem with it.
It's always important to play in the bowl game. All you have to do is look at the other six SEC teams that didn't make it and realize we're in the top half of the SEC. It's certainly fun for all the college kids and coaches to be playing in December, in January. A lot of them are not practicing and wish they were.
I thought we could make a field goal there.
It got sticky there in the fourth quarter,
I think today gave him a little more confidence. He threw the ball with authority most of the day.
I said, 'If it happens in the normal course of the game, then that's the way it's going to happen,' ... We had our backups in there.
I said, 'Dang, we've got big, strong, good-looking offensive linemen. How come they're not blocking as well as I hope? I'm trying to figure that out.
We don't think all this attention will get to him. That's something we talk to him about.
We'll wait and see if he can play or not, ... Antonio will be our quarterback if Blake can't go.
We'll try to help him as much as we can, but he's got to play the game. We'll see what happens.
When you're the head coach in college, the athletic director and president are your bosses, but they do not come in and tell you how to run the football program,