Another round of a random assistant selection take us to Columbia, South Carolina where spring practice is in full swing, just like Steve Spurrier’s long irons game (NAILED IT). Everette Sands begins his second year under Spurrier, and in such a short time has seen more visor-throwing in person that the rest of us combined have seen in our lives.
Name: Everette Sands
Position: Running backs coach
Salary: $185,000, which doesn’t seem like all that much until you think about what you make, and then realize what $185,000 really is.
Alma Mater: The Citadel ’93
Experience: Elon 1996-1998 (not sure which position because I am lazy and assume the internets doesn’t have that information within the first two search pages, which is my limit)
The Citadel 1999-2000 (unclear what he coached; see: my laziness)
Ohio 2001-2004 (running backs)
The Citadel 2005-2010 (running backs)
NC State 2011 (running backs)
South Carolina 2012-present (running backs)
Background: Perhaps if The Citadel had the services of Sands during their 2005 game against Ed Orgeron’s Ole Miss team, they could have taken a lead into halftime instead of being down only 3-0 to a I-A team. Sands, a running back, remains second all-time in yards, points, and touchdowns at The Citadel, and was an All-American his junior year, as well as all-conference for four years.
Oh, and he’s a member of The Citadel Athletic Hall of Fame. So, yes, had he been there in 2005, Orgeron’s life would have been much tougher.
As far as his profession career (ASSUMING THE CITADEL DOESN’T PAY PLAYERS), he’s bounced around a good bit, but did spend a year under Tom O’Brien at NC State. While in Raleigh, O’Brien taught him to love the finer things in life, like ecru walls, water with no ice, and bibliographies.
What he brings to the table: The great part about being such a good college running back is that he can simply fire up the old tape to show his players and say, “OBSERVE.” This would be my strategy because who doesn’t like watching video of themselves doing something awesome, but each film session would end with me lamenting about not making it all the way. I would be a terrible coach.
Sands has a Twitter feed, which mostly reads like a subscription to the Hugh Freeze motivational quote of the day Twitter calendar. However, on January 2nd of this year, he went to Outback with dreams of a blooming onion in his head, but discovered there was an hour and a half wait. Sadly, he never tweeted the end of the story, so who knows if he got that blooming onion.
What he needs to get out of his players in 2013: In 2012, he kept the ship afloat after the injury to Marcus Lattimore, but now he needs to find a starter and a mix of backups. This will prove to be even more important when Steve Spurrier starts the annual Connor Shaw/Dylan Thompson rotation at quarterback, and the South Carolina offense goes through periods of desperately needing something in the positive direction.
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