The move by Texas and Oklahoma to leave the Big 12 for greener—but certainly more difficult football—pastures of the SEC has a lot of people talking.
And with good reason.
Jordan Spieth, a former Texas Longhorn and strong supporter of the sports programs in Austin, was asked to comment on it after the third round of the WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational in Memphis Saturday. He is all for the move.
“Yeah, I mean, I think it can only better our program, so I’m excited about that,” he said. Note how he still calls it “our” program. #HookEm, indeed.
Spieth was a freshman at Texas in 2012 when he was the Big 12 Player of the Year and led the Longhorns to their first national title in 40 years. He turned pro halfway through his sophomore season.
Spieth went on to say that he knows the move to the nation’s elite football conference won’t be easy.
“I don’t think that our record is going to improve as we move to the SEC from the Big 12 right away, but I think recruiting in Austin is should be an easy place to recruit,” he said. “It was for me, and I feel that now that you have the SEC chip, as well as far as football goes, that means it should be even easier. I look forward to the future there.”
Spieth, like many others, sees that the college sports landscape continues to evolve.
“I think we’re just jumping out ahead of the curve. I think the Texas and Oklahoma move might shift a lot of things, but I think it was inevitable with somebody, it was going to be happen in the next few years.”
Spieth is second in the FedEx Cup standings and is not playing this week at the Wyndham Championship, which is the final regular season event before the playoffs start.
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