Kirby Smart Quotes

The University of Notre Dame does not redshirt, and I endorse that policy completely. I am very much in favor of redshirting, but not at Notre Dame. But there's no doubt about it. It puts us at a huge disadvantage.

I don't recruit against Nick Saban. I recruit for the University of Georgia.

College atheletes used to get a degree in bringing your pencil.

A lot of people talk about the one-and-done attitude of college athletes, but if you look at the University of Kentucky, we do build winners.

I was going from Furman to the University of Georgia. I transferred to play football.

If a guy is not serious about being a student-athlete then why force him into the college system. He's not serious about getting education.

I'm saying when young men get to the NCAA Tournament, let's find a way to get their parents and their brothers and sisters a plane ticket and a hotel room. I don't think that's asking too much.

There are guys who have no business being in school, but they're here because this is the path to the NFL. There's no other way. Then there's the other side that says raise the SAT eligibility requirements. OK, raise the SAT requirement at Alabama and see what kind of team they have. You lose athletes, and then the product on the field suffers.

Notre Dame was my dream school growing up. But in recruiting, they had some other plans, what position they wanted me to play.

Even when I was being recruited here to the University of Virginia, a lot of people in my own community didn't think I was Division I football material because I played at a small private school.

Once you start worrying about a national football championship, then you begin to worry about getting the quality of athlete, and the numbers needed, to win a national championship. And that worry leads to pressure to compromise academic standards to admit those athletes.

If football had always been my main goal then I would have gone to some scholarship school; I could have gotten more exposure there.

I played football, honestly, to get a scholarship.

I was a defensive lineman coming out of high school who was considered amongst the top... maybe the top six guys, top five guys, and wanted to prove to my team that I was going to be a top guy going into college.

I got into Temple University on a track scholarship.

I had played in a tournament with the captain of the University of Minnesota's golf team, and he thought I was good. He called his coach, and the coach called me and recruited me. A five-minute phone call changed my life.

Rookies are also coming in from college programs as big stars, whereas when we came in, we were just happy to be there. We were happy to be playing in a big gym, to be on television, to be playing in America.

I think we can benefit from being in the ACC. It's a great basketball league. If anything, it helps our recruiting.

On signing day, my mom brought me the national letter of intent to Arkansas. I should feel like I'm making the right decision. You get that many people telling you that. I had been dreaming about it. I signed 'No' where I was supposed to sign my name and put an exclamation point.

College, our job is to get guys to get better. Work hard, get better and be in position so when your time comes you get to play in the NBA.

My local newspaper, the 'Bend Bulletin,' interviewed me while I was at high school after I had just signed with the University of Oregon. I remember I wore a University of Oregon hooded sweatshirt, and they took a picture of me in the long jump pit. I was freezing!

I call it, 'The Kentucky Effect.' Guys from Kentucky are usually drafted higher, and their shoe contracts are worth more. They're in more demand overall because they played here.

I'm a backup quarterback at the University of Dayton. I was a one-year starter in high school. I think I got the job in high school because our quarterback left and went to another school.

So, college was kind of the only option that I looked at, and I was fortunate to have great coaches when I was at UCLA. They helped me improve on and off the court.

I went to the University of Arizona on a full athletic scholarship for gymnastics, where I competed and got 9th in the nation at the NCAAs.