Sylvester Croom Quotes on Family (3 Quotes)

Ultimately, I am responsible for their actions and I take full responsibility. But I want to stress that these are good kids who come from good families, who made a serious mistake in judgment.

Last February, one of the first major decisions he had to make as coach was determining the fate of leading returning rusher Nick Turner , whohadstruggled academically and had plead guilty to passing counterfeit money. Croom ultimately dismissed Turner from the team but allowed him to keep his scholarship for the spring semester so he could leave the school in good academic standing. If a kid doesn't get that degree, it's going to affect him, his family, the kids he's going to have, ... That's a heavy burden to have. I agonized over that decision for a week.

I don't want a Mississippi State player to play four years for us and not be capable of supporting his family. Twenty years from now, they won't remember the scores. But they'll have kids, they'll have mortgages, they'll have car payments. If they're capable of dealing with that because of what we went through during this time, then it's all worthwhile.