South Carolina Displays Kindness to Rival Clemson

When it comes to college rivalries, some of the more prominent include Ohio State-Michigan, Duke-North Carolina, Auburn-Alabama, USC-UCLA and Missouri-Kansas.

You can certainly add Clemson-South Carolina to that list. The two head football coaches at each school, Dabo Swinney at Clemson and Steve Spurrier at South Carolina, love to throw barbs at one another, as evidenced by this ESPN article.

This week, the rivalry displayed a softer side. Swinney returned to practice Wednesday following the death of his father, Ervil Swinney, on Aug. 8.

Swinney said several of the cards, emails and messages he received came from South Carolina fans and administrators, according to ClemsonTigers.com. The school’s website also reported South Carolina’s athletic department sent Swinney an arrangement that featured orange flowers. The arrangement was displayed on the front of Swinney’s desk in his Memorial Stadium office.

ESPN college football reporter Matt Fortuna reported the act of kindness on Wednesday. LostLettermen.com passed along the report to its followers:

Classy move from South Carolina: http://t.co/GRieT9rY52 pic.twitter.com/JbEKhsGlFk

— Lost Lettermen (@LostLettermen) August 13, 2015

While we’re on the subject of light-heartedness this week, Spurrier told reporters the opposite of what you normally hear from college football coaches during training camp:

Steve Spurrier mocked optimistic coaches with a purposely negative interview, just because: http://t.co/fsEBnoBgBi https://t.co/rzCdyo7232

— Lost Lettermen (@LostLettermen) August 12, 2015