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SEC expert: Kirby Smart on Coaches’ Mount Rushmore but still in Nick Saban’s shadow
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SEC expert: Kirby Smart on Coaches’ Mount Rushmore but still in Nick Saban’s shadow
ATHENS — Georgia has passed Alabama football on the field with back-to-back national titles, but as SEC Network star Peter Burns explained Kirby Smart is still fighting to get out of Nick Saban’s shadow.
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Burns has always pushed the Georgia narrative and I appreciate his ability to move away from Kirk Herbstreit, Reece Davis and other ESPN talking heads that can too often overlook what Georgia is doing and the impact the program has had and will have on college football. Kirby is doing it the same way Saban did it, with elite recruiting, quality development of players and all of this in spite of excellent coordinators leaving the program (Lanning, Monken). AND Kirby is having success in spite of many players leaving through the portal and taking advantage of NIL. Those are obstacles that Saban didn't face when he was winning back to back titles with the Bama program. Saban doesn't seem to be navigating the waters of the portal and NIL as well as Kirby is. It will be interesting to see how this season and post-season plays out.
Spurrier won 1 championship at FU. His record against good teams in bowl games is 11-10. Spurrier's running his mouth and self promoting his "coaching" skills are not backed up when you consider FU was the destination of choice for HS FB players in the #1 state for HS FB players. He was run out of the NFL and quit on his team mid-season. Spurrier should never be mentioned in the same sentence as CKS or CNS.
It's way too early for this Mount Rushmore of SEC Coaches talk. Come on. At least let's see what a 10-year period looks like.
Agreed. No one should doubt that Spurrier thinks he ought to be on Mt. Rushmore. In almost every statistical category (wins, winning %, SEC titles, SEC coach of the year), Spurrier just barely beats out Dooley's accomplishments. And they both had exactly the same number of national championships.
Yet many people wouldn't even think of putting Dooley in the same league (pun intended). It's partly recency bias. But it t's mainly that Spurrier was and continues to be a big self-promoter.
Robert Neyland won four national championships at Tennessee and Johnny Vaught won three at Ole Miss. You could make a case for Neyland being on Mt. Rushmore before Spurrier.
From within lizard land itself, you could almost make more of a case for Urban legend than Spurrier since he won 2 nattys there. Hard to do though because his pro coaching experience gives even his Stevenness the edge!
Spurrier won 6 SEC titles (arguably 7 if you count the first year) in 12 years at a school that had never before won even one --- including 4 in a row in this SEC Championship Game era which still has not been matched -- and revolutionized the style of play in the SEC from 3 yards and a cloud of dust. HIs dominance over his rivals was legendary, and only a perennially Top 5 ranked FSU and a legendary Nebraska team got in his way. Spurrier doesn't self-promote, people seek his opinions because he was a great football coach --- even managed to beat Saban at Alabama when he was at South Carolina and was 3-1 vs. Nick, stomping the 2001 SEC championship LSU team, That's just crazy.
OK, OK, @MikeGriffith. Points well taken (except for the one about self-promotion). But I can still hate him, can't I? :-)
Good point that I forgot to add. Spurrier isn't even the best coach in FU history. Meyer is. He won because he had better players ie HE WAS RECRUITING FLORIDA! He was Jimbo Fisher before Jimbo Fisher. He was a QB who loved to throw and became a coach who loved to throw in an era of running. Why that's brilliant! And he recruited to that end.
Definition of a "Mount Rushmore" coach: "This phrase is traditionally meant to refer to legendary Alabama head coach Paul “Bear” Bryant, and the full phrase was that he “could take his'n and beat your'n, then take your'n and beat his'n.” Spurrier's 11-10 Bowl Game record tells me he could barely beat your'n with his'n.
In Spurrier's 29 yr coaching career he had six 11 or better win seasons. Hardly a MT Rushmore resume. Mark Richt had four 11+ win seasons in 18 seasons. And Richt has a better Bowl Game winning %.