Stephen Hargis: Bill Curry's perspective on 'The Huddle' more appropriate now than ever

Aug. 19—Anyone fortunate enough to have heard Bill Curry stand at a podium and speak to a captive audience knows the man has a gift for storytelling.

I still contend that Curry, the former head football coach at Alabama, Kentucky, Georgia Tech and Georgia State, and who once headed Baylor School's leadership program, was arguably among the finest guest speakers we've ever had at our annual Times Free Press Best of Preps banquet.

He has a knack for cutting straight to the point and relating to his audience in such a way that everyone feels closer as a group by the end of his time in front of a microphone.

I had heard his take on "The Huddle" several years ago, but when a friend recently sent the link to that speech, it resonated even greater amid all the chaos and division that currently runs through our nation. I listened to every word he spoke, then restarted it and listened again, mesmerized and nodding in agreement at his perspective.

And I thought to myself how, now more than ever, that entire speech should be required listening.

Curry originally relayed the story in the days that followed the tragic events of Sept. 11, 2001. While the nation mourned the terrorist attacks, the sports world wrestled with the decision of whether athletic games should continue to be played that weekend.

Working as a college football game analyst for ESPN at the time, Curry was dispatched to Birmingham, Alabama, to begin preparations in case the Southern Miss at Alabama game wound up getting played on the Saturday after 9/11.

Since flights had been grounded, Curry drove toward his destination, stopping in the map-dot town of Attalla, about an hour outside of Birmingham, for gas and to stretch his legs. The gas station attendant, recognizing Curry, asked, "Coach are they going to play the games this weekend?"

Curry replied: "I don't know. But if this cellphone in my pocket rings while I'm in your station, you may be the first fan in America to find out."

Curry's phone did, in fact, ring while he was at the station, and the voice on the other end informed him to return home; the college games had been postponed. Curry relayed how the gas station worker leaned in and said: "Let me tell you something, Coach; in Atalla, Alabama, come Friday night, we're going to play football 'cause it means a lot to us."

Curry said as he left the station and began to drive back home, he wondered to himself: "Why would somebody think it's important to play a high school football game on Friday night in Atalla, Alabama? And why would it matter in Pueblo, Colorado? Or Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, or upstate New York?"

Pausing for effect, Curry then answered his own question: "It came to me that it's the huddle. It's the huddle. Because you can't step in the huddle anymore and be a racist. You can't step in the huddle and say 'I'm not playing with that guy because he's a Muslim.' You can't do that, because everybody's welcome in that huddle.

"And what happens in the stands in Atalla, Alabama, and College Park, Georgia, and all across the nation on Friday night? When somebody's child scores a touchdown, everybody hugs. They don't stop to see what color the pigmentation is. You hug because your team just did something. And that huddle is emblematic of what America could be. It brings the community together in ways that the rest of our culture has not arrived at."

So as a new season kicks off Friday, at a time when it feels there are more things separating us than bringing us together, the life lessons high school football can teach, and what the huddle represents, might be needed more now than ever.

Contact Stephen Hargis at shargis@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6293. Follow him on Twitter @StephenHargis.