Kiffin vs. Spurrier: Vols and Gamecocks Hoping History Repeats Itself

In 1990 the SEC welcomed a new coach into it's illustrious fraternity. That coach would go on to become one of the greatest the conference has ever seen. That coach was never confused as a nice guy.

He was a young 45 and had a mouth the size of Florida. That coach, Steve Spurrier, would build a dynasty from nothing. That dynasty, even though he hasn't been it's leader since 2001, is still going strong.

As a matter of fact that Florida dynasty has been the most successful program in the SEC since 1990, and no one else is really even close.

Sure, Urban Meyer gets a ton of credit for what is going on now, but if not for "The Ole Ball Coach" Meyer probably would not have had such an easy time in building that Florida program back to its lofty 1990's perch.

Spurrier came into the league with all the moxie, cockiness, and swagger of a 15-year veteran coach that had won numerous championships. He didn't care whom he offended. He called out other SEC programs.

One account has him at a pep rally in 1991, right before the Auburn game, telling jokes about the War Eagle program and it's library.

Spurrier said, "I heard a sad story today. The Auburn library burnt to the ground. The sad thing was all 20 books were completely destroyed. What's worse, 15 of them hadn't even been colored in yet!" That's one-year into his tenure as an SEC head coach.

A few years later he would throw down the gauntlet in the Tennessee-Florida rivalry, one which he won way more than he lost, by saying, "You can't spell Citrus without UT" a reference to the bowl now known as the Capital One Bowl for the second-place SEC East team.

Spurrier quipped once that in-state rival Florida State's "FSU" initials stood for "Free Shoes University" after a scandal involving athletes receiving extra benefits to attend there.

According to the Palm Beach Post, Spurrier once remarked, “In 12 years at Florida, I don’t think we ever signed a kid form the state of Alabama. Of course, we found out later that the scholarships they were giving out at Alabama were worth a whole lot more than ours.”

The bottom line is that this guy was something new. Something fresh in a conference of the old, Johnny Majors and Gene Stallings; the bad, Watson Brown and Sparky Woods; and the ugly, Bill Curry and Ray Goff.

Compared to all those soft spoken yet wily veterans this guy came off like a loose cannon. A funny, yet condescending new guy with little respect.

Sound familiar?

Lane Kiffin came in this season with even more cockiness and a greater sure-of-himself attitude than Spurrier. Would that have been possible without Spurrier first blazing that path nearly 20 years ago?

The boy wonder, as many like to call the 33-year old Tennessee head coach, came into a much different SEC than Spurrier did. Steve Spurrier came in during the good 'ole boys reign.

Back when Alabama's head coach was a previous understudy of Bear Bryant. Tennessee's head coach played for Gen. Robert Neyland. Georgia's head coach was a quarterback for Vince Dooley. Even Spurrier himself was an illustrious alumni of the Gators program--a heisman winning quarterback, in fact.

The SEC coaching fraternity was a tradition-rich group that believed in "keeping it in the family." Spurrier came into that group and dominated.

However, toward the end of Spurrier's tenure at Florida a new era dawned in the SEC coaching hierarchy. The "hired-gun" era took front and center with the hiring of Nick Saban at LSU.

Alabama hired highly successful national coaches Mike Price and Dennis Franccione, eschewing the Bear Bryant coaching lineage for the first time in nearly two decades.

Florida went after Urban Meyer after Spurrier's understudy Ron Zook failed miserably. South Carolina got Sweet Lou Holtz to come out of retirement after his days at Notre Dame. Georgia went after a Florida State offensive coordinator named Mark Richt.

After Saban left LSU the Tigers went after another successful national coach, Les Miles. Then Alabama paid Nick Saban a ton to come back to the SEC. Even the Ole' Ball Coach himself decided to come back to the league, this time with South Carolina.

It's a different league, boys. Spurrier's SEC was much easier than Kiffin's ever thought of being. Kiffin's SEC has some of the nation's best coaches, who are consistently recruiting some of the nation's very best athletes.

That's what we in the business refer to as a "far cry" from what Steve Spurrier landed in two decades ago.

Spurrier came in letting people know who he was, but there was pretty much no one to stop him. Kiffin has much greater odds and a much more hostile environment in which to work.

Spurrier became known for winning shortly after arriving at Florida. Kiffin is on his way, but until the wins start rolling he has to use his greatest resource, his mouth, to get his message out there.

I'm a firm believer that history repeats itself. Even though the circumstances are different than they were in 1990, Lane Kiffin has begun building at Tennessee just like Steve Spurrier did at Florida.

A prime opportunity to keep building on the Vols sudden momentum present itself this weekend. On Halloween night the past meets the future. Steve Spurrier and his Gamecocks takes on the Lane Train and his Vols.

For Kiffin this is the first step in winning out and potentially winding up in a decent bowl after a pretty bad start to things. For Spurrier it's the beginning of finally reclaiming the mojo for South Carolina that helped put Florida on the map in the 90's.  

Spurrier had great success over the Vols and Phil Fulmer for many years (8-5). But this is a new era in Knoxville. An era that Lane Kiffin is dead set on setting a positive tone in for recruiting, coaching, and ultimately winning a ton of games.

Saturday night's clash may feature two coaches from completely separate era's, but the goal is still the same—win football games, and win them now.