South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier reacted to Georgia’s hire of St. Louis Rams play-caller Brian Schottenheimer as its new offensive coordinator during his annual postseason meeting with local media. Schottenheimer was Danny Wuerffel’s primary backup at Florida, playing for the Gators under Spurrier from 1994-96.

He has spent 16 of the last 18 years as an assistant in the NFL. The son of Marty Schottenheimer, Brian’s been a candidate for several recent head coach openings but a return to the SEC was an opportunity he couldn’t pass up.

“He’s been an NFL coach, I don’t know why he went to college,” Spurrier said Wednesday night. “Maybe he wanted to go back to college or maybe it was just a good opportunity for him. And that is an excellent opportunity for any coach. Georgia always has a whole bunch of good players. They’ve probably been the most consistent team in the East. Well, maybe they haven’t been. Heck, we’ve beat them four out of five years, haven’t we? But overall they’ve probably been one of the best teams on the Eastern side.”

Twenty NFL teams scored more points than Schottenheimer’s unit in St. Louis this season, but Spurrier says there’s a reason for that.

“They had a great defense, and sometimes when you coach with a tremendous defense, your offense is, ‘Just don’t mess up, and don’t turn it over.’ But he’s a good, solid, proven coach.”