Goodbye to Gators McGriff and Covington, Plus More Tidbits
Tuesday, February 7, 2017 | General, Scott Carter
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By: Scott Carter, Senior Writer
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Perry Colson McGriff Jr. lived a life so full it's difficult to know where to begin.
Since this space is dedicated to UF athletics, let's start there. McGriff was a two-way standout for the Gators football team in the late 1950s and a three-time All-American for the UF baseball team. Perry McGriff Jr. as a UF student. (File photo)
In his finest season as a football player, McGriff led the Gators in receiving in 1959 and caught the first two-point conversion pass in Southeastern Conference history in 1959 against Mississippi State.
He was later drafted by the NFL's Baltimore Colts and the AFL's San Diego Chargers. However, McGriff opted to play professional baseball and spent two years in the Kansas City Athletics organization. McGriff, who died Thursday at 79 and whose funeral lured several University Athletic Association employees Tuesday morning, was much more than an accomplished athlete.
He was mayor of Gainesville. Owner of a successful insurance company. A member of the Florida House and an Alachua County commissioner.
Former UF sports information director Norm Carlson, who now serves as the Gators' official historian, shared his sentiments online in a message he shared on McGriff's guest book on Legacy.com.
"Farewell to a good man, a great credit to his family, the state of Florida and the city of Gainesville,'' Carlson and wife Sylvia wrote. "We will always remember his efforts as a Gator athlete with tremendous talent who used his ability to make the Orange and Blue better. Rest in peace."
McGriff would still stop by football practice occasionally to check in on the Gators and say hello to old friends. His son, Mark McGriff, played for the Gators and McGriff's first cousin, Lee McGriff, is UF's current radio analyst.
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The Gators lost another member of their storied past recently with the death of Ted Covington, a broadcast partner of former UF play-by-play voice Otis Boggs for more than two decades until 1971.
The 96-year-old Covington was a longtime Lakeland resident and co-founder of WONN radio station in 1949 following his service in World War II (read more about Covington's distinguished military career).
Covington died of natural causes on Jan. 25 and there is a memorial service planned in Lakeland for him on Saturday. Covington started to work in the radio booth with Boggs regularly in the 1950s and the two formed a pairing that was in place when Carlson returned to his alma mater in 1962.
"They were a really good pair,'' Carlson said. "They would kid around all the time and make the broadcast interesting. They brought history up a lot."
Edmund D. "Ted" Covington was born in Plant City, Fla., on March 12, 1920. He began his radio career at WRUF.
"He was always a huge, huge Gator fan, not just football – swimming, baseball, tennis, whatever he could find to watch,'' Becky Calder, one of Covington's daughters, told The Lakeland Ledger.
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A photo of former Gators quarterback Jacoby Brissett at Tuesday's parade in Boston to celebrate New England's Super Bowl victory got me thinking. Has a quarterback who started a game at Florida ever won a Super Bowl ring as a player?
Answer: Brissett is the first.
Rex Grossman led the Bears to a Super Bowl but they lost to the Colts. Cam Newton led Carolina to the Super Bowl a year ago but they lost to Denver (coincidentally, both lost to teams quarterbacked by Peyton Manning). Plus, Newton never started a game for the Gators before his exit from UF.
You may recall, in Brissett's two seasons at Florida he became the first true freshman in the program's history to make his college debut as UF's starting quarterback. The Gators lost that day at LSU 41-11.
Brissett played in 13 games over his two seasons at UF and started four. He transferred to N.C. State after the 2012 season and was a two-year starter for the Wolfpack and a third-round pick of New England in the 2016 draft.
With Patriots starter Tom Brady suspended the first four games of the season, Brissett made a pair of starts as a rookie, completing 34 of 55 passes for 400 yards, no touchdowns and no interceptions.
On Tuesday, decked in a Brady jersey, he capped his rookie season with a ticker-tape parade.
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ORANGE & BLUE EXTRAS
Multiple reports surfaced Tuesday that Drew Hughes, Florida's director of player personnel and a key piece to the program's recruiting efforts, was leaving for South Carolina. Soon afterward, multiple reports surfaced that he was staying at UF. Here is the latest on Hughes remaining at UF from SECCountry.com Gators beat writer Zach Abolverdi … Gators women's basketball signee Karissa McLaughlinrecently shot her way into the Homestead (Ind.) High record books. McLaughlin made a school-record 12 3-pointers – she only played three quarters in the 100-17 rout – and became the first player in program history to score 40 points in a game. McLaughlin struck again on Friday night, pouring in another 40 points as Homestead defeated Huntington North for the school's fourth consecutive sectional title … UF graduate Dan Glod is the new president of the Web.com Tour. Glod was promoted to president of the professional golf tour at the start of 2017 and broke into the golf business working at Gainesville's Meadowbrook Golf Club in the early 1990s. Gainesville Sun columnist Pat Dooleyhas more on Glod … UF graduate Amber Wilson, a practicing attorney and co-host of the "Zaslow, Roms and Amber Morning Show" on Miami's leading sports radio station WAXY-790, announced on-air Tuesday that she is taking a break from the show due to breast cancer. Best wishes to Amber.
