Lee Corso, IU's football coach from 1973-1982, owned a career highlighted by the school's first bowl victory in 75 years, a 38-37 decision over previously unbeaten Brigham Young in the 1979 Holiday Bowl. After 28 years of coaching football, Corso joined ESPN in 1987, where he serves as a game analyst for the Thursday night telecasts and as a studio analyst for College "GameDay" as well as the halftime and scoreboard shows. He also is director of business development for Dixon Ticonderoga in Florida. The following are excerpts from a recent phone interview with the famous coach.
Indiana Daily Student: You look like you're having the time of your life on "GameDay." Are you?\nLee Corso: I enjoy it, but it's not the time of my life. The time of my life was when I was a college head football coach.
IDS: What kind of teasing do you get about wearing the headpiece of college team mascots?\nLC: There's a lot of good-natured fun. It's become kind of trademark.
IDS: Will "GameDay" ever broadcast from Bloomington?\nLC: I don't know. The opponent has to be a really high-ranked team in the nation and Indiana has to have a chance to win the game.
IDS: How many people come up to you a day saying, "Not so fast, my friend?"\nLC: A lot. A whole lot. That's really become kind of my password.
IDS: How much homework goes into making your bold prognostications during the show?\nLC: I lived college football almost my entire life, so I know a lot about it. Then we have research people, and I make a lot of phone calls to my friends to try and get some inside information. That's how I come up with my picks.
IDS: There's a story that you walked onto the field during an IU-Ohio State game and snapped a picture of the scoreboard. What is that about?\nLC: It had been 25 years since Indiana had beat Woody Hayes, and they had never been ahead of him. So when we got ahead of him 7-6, I walked on the field, called timeout and took a picture of the scoreboard. But the final was 47-7.
IDS: How does the IU-Purdue rivalry compare with other D1, in-state matchups in the country?\nLC: To me, it was the biggest one, and I did my whole program based on the IU-Purdue game. It's a big rivalry, but it's not a great rivalry nationally because Indiana hasn't been able to beat Purdue well enough. You have to have both teams winning to be a rivalry.
IDS: What was it like coaching football at a basketball school?\nLC: I must be crazy. I was the head football coach for 14 years at two of the best basketball schools in America, Louisville and Indiana. I always used basketball at both of those schools as an opportunity to get my team well known. I never saw it as a disadvantage; in fact, I used it as an advantage.
IDS: You roomed with teammate and future movie star Burt Reynolds at Florida State. What did that do for your social life?\nLC: He was so good looking I used to send him out as bait. He would go over to the student union and bring two girls back. One was beautiful and the other one was ugly, and I always got his ugly girlfriend. But what I found out was that his ugly girlfriends were better than anything I could get on my own. His looks helped me, but the key thing was his looks and my car. We killed in Tallahassee.
IDS: How has your master's degree in administration and supervision helped you along the way?\nLC: I think it was the key to getting the University of Louisville job, my first head coaching job. They made two or three references to the fact that I went out and got a master's degree and didn't get right into coaching. It was very, very worthwhile.
IDS: Besides its use for standardized test score sheets, what are some other uses of the Dixon No. 2 pencil? \nLC: The Dixon No. 2 pencil is the world's most famous pencil, and the best one you can get. It's a wonderful prop. I keep one in my hand on television. It's a wonderful security blanket. \n-- Contact staff writer Bill Meehan at wmeehand@indiana.edu.
