For many years (35 to be exact) I could care less about watching football. 21 years of living in North Florida (football) country didn't interest me in the least. Looking back I think I know why, but that is a sadder story for another time. 13 years in Tennessee didn't produce an interest in me either. My students would ask me for my favorite football team and I relpied honestly I didn't have one. The same question about basketball teams got a different response but one that shows my heart wasn't in it.
"Mr. Jackson, do you at least have a favorite basketball team?"
"Why yes, I think I'd have to go with the Harlem Globetrotters!"
In 1991 we moved back to Florida and I started hearing the buzz about Steve Spurrier and the Florida Gators. FUN'N'GUN was tearing up the SEC (and changed the complexion of college football from smashmouth to finesse for awhile- I personally think it's a mixture now). I finally started reading and watching because for the first time in my life football was interesting to me and I owed it all to one man- the ol' ball coach (or "the evil genius" as his opponents thought of him), Steve Spurrier.
For a long time I thought I was primarily a Gator fan but when he left I learned I was a Spurrier fan first and a Gator fan second. I actually rooted for him last year against the Gators at their first head to head. But what about this year. Am I going to pull for the Coach who made me interested in football or the team he used to draw me in?
The Gators have a chance at another national title shot if things go their way in the next few weeks. South Carolina has a shot at a bowl game if they win at least one more. Let the Gamecocks win one more... just NOT this one. Not this week. Not this way. GO GATORS!
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