Kirk Herbstreit sat directly to Lee Corso’s left in 1996 when “Coach” donned a mascot head on ESPN’s “College GameDay” for the first time.
“He did the Queen Elizabeth wave with the Brutus Buckeye head on, and I just remember watching him and thinking how silly it looked,” said Herbstreit, Corso’s longtime GameDay sidekick. “It was crazy and funny, but I figured it was a one-and-done. I didn’t think it would ever become a thing.”
Thirty years later, it’s still a thing. The headgear picks are an iconic piece of college football lore, a moment synonymous with Saturday mornings in the fall. And the same goes for the man with Bucky Badger, the Sooner Schooner or the Oregon Duck atop his head, wagging his No. 2 pencil and warning, “Not so fast, my friend!”
On Saturday, Aug. 30, at age 90, after 38-plus seasons on the desk and 430 headgear selections, Corso will retire from television and “College GameDay.” ESPN’s Week 1 episode in Columbus, Ohio, for Texas versus Ohio State will be his last, a chance for the living legend to bid farewell to the show — and sport — he helped elevate.
A former college football player and coach, Corso joined ESPN in 1987 as an analyst for the new and first-of-its-kind college football preview show. Over the next four decades, GameDay evolved into a traveling paragon of sports television, barnstorming its way across college campuses each week, with Corso serving as master of ceremonies. Despite suffering a stroke in 2009 that impacted his speech, he’s remained a beloved Saturday staple.
Before Corso takes a final bow — and makes a final headgear pick — The Athletic asked his GameDay co-workers, past and present, on screen and off it, for their favorite stories about the “Grandfather of College Football.”
Rece Davis, “College GameDay” host: What separates him? You mean other than a fully grown adult man putting on a mascot head every week?
Chris “Bear” Fallica, former “College GameDay” researcher: He’s a creature of habit.
Jim Gaiero, “College GameDay” producer: Coach calls me every Monday morning at 9:30. Tuesday at 9:30. Wednesday at 9:30.
David Pollack, former “College GameDay” analyst: He barely knows how to use his cell phone, which is a flip phone.
Fallica: Monday morning, I’m getting into work my first season there (in 1996), and I get a voicemail: “Chris Fallica, this is Lee Corso. I’m looking for the following information for the show this week.” He would rattle off his list of notes and stats, things he wanted. That same message came every Monday or Tuesday morning from 1996 until 2022.
Davis: Coming downstairs in the hotel on Friday morning, seeing LC with his briefcase and coffee cup and him saying, “Hey, sweetheart, how we doing?”
Fallica: He had his blue, black and red Sharpies. And of course, the Dixon Ticonderoga No. 2 pencil.
Pollack: The first thing he does every trip he goes on is he finds the local church.
Fallica: That was a big responsibility for our operations people: to find the nearest Catholic church and what time the mass was.
Gene Wojciechowski, former ESPN reporter and “College GameDay” contributor: On Friday after the production meeting he would do his fly-by on the snacks tables.
Derek Volner, ESPN Director of Communications: He is legendary for bringing what we call “the production food” back to his hotel room.
Maria Taylor, former “College GameDay” contributor: Always grabbing something, walking back and forth to it. He never met a snack table he didn’t like.
Kirk Herbstreit, “College GameDay” analyst: He has this old-ass satchel.
Pollack: Black leather, worn all over the place.
Herbstreit: And he goes right down the snack table they have set up: Mr. Goodbar, Hershey, Snickers, he’ll grab three of those, he’ll get four bags of chips — Doritos, Lays, BBQ. All of it goes into his bag.
Wojciechowski: Like a farmer with the fall harvest.
Pollack: It wasn’t like taking one or two. The 1920s briefcase is wide open, arm scraping across the table, shoveling it into the briefcase.
Chris Fowler, former “College GameDay” host: So he doesn’t have to buy dinner.
Herbstreit: Then he goes to the refrigerator and he’ll grab a Mountain Dew, Dr Pepper, Root Beer, Sprite and a Coke.
Desmond Howard, “College GameDay” analyst: It’s like an SNL skit.
Pollack: Then he’s back in the hotel at 4 p.m., and he’s in his PJs and ready for bed.
Tim Brando, former “College GameDay” host: The one thing Lee would almost never do was come out on Friday night for dinner.
Herbstreit: He would say, “Sweetheart, I’m not going to dinner. It’s game night. I gotta get ready for the show.” One time I had to drop something off in his room and sure enough: white T-shirt, blue pajama pants, footies, and all those drinks and snacks are lined up on his window, a huge sub sandwich.
Craig James, former “College GameDay” analyst: One time in the early days we were on the road, and we were actually sharing a hotel room. Lee always claimed that he liked to wear a robe before bed, smoke a cigar and take a shot of NyQuil and go to sleep. So he’s sitting on his bed smoking a cigar, finishes it up, slams down the NyQuil and looks over at me and says, “Goodnight, sweetheart.” I almost peed my pants.
After Corso started the headgear tradition nearly a decade into the show’s run, every episode of “College GameDay” builds to the climactic final moment: Which headgear will Corso wear? That decision signals his pick for winner of the marquee matchup from where the show broadcasts each week. Corso’s all-time record entering his final GameDay is 286-144. He has picked Ohio State a record 45 times over his tenure.
“Stanford” Steve Coughlin, “College GameDay” contributor: College football is Lee Corso putting on the headgear at the end of GameDay.
Patrick Abrahams, former “College GameDay” producer: It was guaranteed that my phone would ring at 11:02 a.m. every Sunday, with coach Corso telling me who he was going to pick that week. He knew right away.
Pollack: During the Friday production meetings, he’s pacing back and forth until the headgear gets there. Then he’s cool, then he’s good.
Abrahams: It’s what he lived for.
Davis: You can’t kick off college football on Saturday until LC puts the headgear on.
Marisa Dowling, “College GameDay” researcher: The crowd is locked on everything that he’s doing.
Taylor: If he raises his hand to his ear, everyone goes wild. The whole crowd melts at his feet.
Fowler: The entertainers we had on as guest pickers knew who they were playing with. They had a great time with it.
Howard: We had Bill Murray on the show, and Bill Murray body slammed Corso on our set. Corso was laughing and giggling, and I asked Lee afterward if Bill told him he was going to do that, and Lee was like, “Hell no!”
Howard: The Katy Perry one is legendary. She snatched that mascot head (Alabama’s Big Al elephant) off of him and messed his nose up.
Fowler: It cut his nose. Those things are not made to be yanked off. Blood was drawn that morning.
Abrahams: We’re doing pictures after the show, but Coach didn’t want to make her feel like she did anything wrong — he loved that moment. So he’s shooing the makeup person away because he didn’t want to make Katy feel as if she didn’t belong or had done anything wrong.
Gaiero: He was never afraid to say what was on his mind.
Herbstreit: We were in Miami, late 1990s or early 2000s. He said something that really upset the Miami fan base, I don’t remember, but they showed up at the set and were booing the whole show. We had about a 200-foot walk from the set to the cars that were going to take us to the airport. They tried to line up security to almost make a human tunnel to the car, and the crowd is yelling things and throwing things. Fowler is in front of me, Corso is behind me, and we’re all holding hands and crouching down trying to get through. And someone must have grabbed Corso, because I feel him let go of my hand, and I turn around and Corso is squaring up, Jack Dempsey-style, saying, “Which one of you sons of b—-es grabbed me? Which one?” He was ready to fight.
Pollack: He’s such a trip. I’ve never seen anyone like him.
One of Corso’s most memorable headgear moments came on Nov. 19, 2011, for a game in Houston between SMU and the undefeated hometown Cougars.
Herbstreit: We get to the picks and (guest picker, Olympian and Houston alum) Carl Lewis makes his pick, I make mine — Houston was the huge favorite, there was no shock. But Corso loves to wind up the crowd before he makes a pick, so he grabs the SMU megaphone.
Fowler: His “fake-left, go-right” plan (to stir up the fans) wasn’t really going to work.
Herbstreit: Usually, people boo when he does something like that, and in his head, he’s like, I gotcha, then he pulls out the Houston Cougar head and everyone loves him. But no one reacted. So in the middle of not getting a reaction, he just throws the megaphone and says, “Ahhh, f— it.”
Fowler: Like, f— it, I’m going to pick Houston.
Fallica: I immediately look over at Kirk on set and start mouthing, “Did he just say…?” Kirk’s eyes get big; he’s staring right at me.
Herbstreit: I think I threw my pen up. I’m looking inside the (Houston Cougar) head like, “I can’t believe you just said that.”
Howard: The funniest part was the apology. They have this apology cue card, and when you do something on air like that, you have to read the apology on air.
Herbstreit: He has a huge smile.
Fowler: Can I say a s–t-eating grin?
Herbstreit: Like he’s selling a Home Depot product.
Howard: He’s laughing and smiling, and they had to stop him and make him do it again. They were like, “Lee, you have to read this like you’re really apologizing.”
Herbstreit: Just a piece of work.
Fallica: I was traveling with Kirk to the ABC prime-time game that he was calling (at Oregon) that night. We finally get to Autzen Stadium, and as soon as (then-Oregon coach) Chip Kelly sees Kirk on the field, Chip makes a beeline to Kirk and says, “Can you believe what Corso said (this morning in Houston)? God, I love that guy.”
Brando: He’s a national treasure! The man can say whatever he wants.
Fallica: Lee Corso, the only man who could drop an F-bomb on national television and not only live to tell about it, but become more beloved in the process.
Corso’s energetic blend of irreverence and showmanship broke the mold among college football commentators.
Abrahams: Coach is the ultimate entertainer.
Brando: We were walking out of our first show (in 1987), and we were all very excited and thought it had gone well, and Corso says to me, “Hey, sweetheart, I’m gonna be the Dick Vitale of college football.” Holy s—! One show, and we had already created a monster.
Herbstreit: My first impression was: “This guy is nuts.” That’s the part I wish younger people realized. He was the Pat McAfee of his time. He would do things that no one else would do.
Abrahams: He would always say, “It’s entertainment, sweetheart. Football is just a vehicle.”
Davis: His mantra.
Pollack: He’s always waiting for a “Not so fast!”
Fowler: He taught me to take your work seriously, take your job seriously, but don’t take yourself seriously all the time.
Gaiero: We went to Penn State, and Penn State has this great tradition where the students will grab the mascot and crowd surf the Nittany Lion during the game. So we decided to have Corso crowd surf on GameDay.
Abrahams: Coach would say yes to everything.
Davis: Security was worried, and we told them, “If you guys feel like you can’t get him back to the set, just scrap it.” The Lion was still going to crowd surf. So about a minute before air, production says we’re not doing this.
Gaiero: Our director hears from security that it’s not safe.
Davis: I have them patch me into LC, and I told him security is worried the fans won’t put him down. “They might crowd-surf you all the way to the creamery, they love you so much. Just come back up to set and we’ll play it straight.” And Lee goes, “Hell no, sweetheart, we’re doing this.”
Abrahams: One year, we were opening in Sundance Square in Fort Worth, Texas, (for Alabama versus Wisconsin) and Coach wanted an elephant. A live elephant.
Gaiero: The crazier the idea, the more he was into doing it.
Abrahams: So I contacted a circus that was a couple of states over, and we got the elephant transported to Fort Worth. The show was going to end with Coach riding an elephant down the middle of the main street with the Alabama headgear. We start getting calls from PETA and Disney, and we ended up shutting it down. From that point, Lee was always like, “We tell no one.”
Fowler: You should see the promos we shot in the summer. I don’t know if people would get high and come up with ideas of how to sell GameDay, but let’s put Corso in a 1920s striped swimsuit and floating on a duck in a swimming pool at USC.
Jen Lada, “College GameDay” reporter: He’ll dress up as James Madison or the Statue of Liberty. That’s such a good lesson for people who get into this industry or any industry.
James: His personality is so unique, and not just the headgear, but being witty and sharp.
Pollack: Everything was just, “Tell me what to do.” If you told Coach to get in a pair of Whitey Tighties and sit on stage and eat a Twinkie, he would do it.
Brando: Corso embodies finding the fun in the sport.
Davis: Even as he got a little older — had the stroke, missed some shows a couple years ago — he was so competitive. He wanted to be part of everything.
Pete Thamel, “College GameDay” insider: When the definitive history of college football is written, there may not be a more important person in helping popularize the game than Lee Corso.
Taylor: College football is a religion, and he’s the patron saint. I don’t know what Saturdays will be like without him, but I know they won’t be the same.
Davis: He’s the favorite uncle. Your grandfather. The guy you wanted to share your Saturday with and watch the game with. That’s the beauty and magic of Lee Corso.
Herbstreit: At the end of the day, when you bring up Lee Corso and you’re starting to tell someone a story, everyone starts to smile. That’s what he did for all of us. He made us smile.
(Illustration: Kelsea Petersen / The Athletic; Icon Sportswire / Getty, Ric Tapia / Getty, Ted Warren / AP, Rogelio Solis / Getty)