The wait is over, EA Sports “College Football 25” went live Monday with the early access period ahead of Friday’s worldwide release.
It was the hot topic of the day, and rightfully so as it ended an 11-year drought of the video game since its last release and had its anticipation and hype built up over the last several months with teases.
The hype swell was so much that it was the topic of conversation during the car ride from the airport to the Omni Hotel in Dallas for the Georgia football team yesterday, according to Bulldogs coach Kirby Smart. It was a conversation that the two-time national championship coach said Tuesday at SEC Media Day made him feel old.
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“Three guys we got here today, I want to speak on behalf of those guys, but first I want to give you a quick story to show you when you know you’re getting old. And it got me yesterday,” Smart said at SEC Football Media Day Tuesday. “Not to speak on Coach Saban, because I got a lot of kind words to say about him coming up but I always saw him as older when he was coaching and I saw myself as younger. And now I’m looking at it like, ‘Man, I’m old.’
“I’m riding in the car yesterday with Mykel (Williams), Malachi (Starks) and Carson Beck. We’re coming from the airport to the hotel and I’m sharing (a) conversation with Mykel and Malachi and of course, what’s everybody talking about yesterday? What are all college football players talking about? (NCAA College Football 25), right? The new game that is out.
“And I’m just trying to get in the conversation and talk to ’em about it. And I said, ‘Man, that game’s pretty awesome. And they’re like, ‘Yeah, I can’t wait to get to the hotel and I’m going to play it tonight. And everybody’s talking about it. … It’s all over everything.’ And I was like, ‘How do they keep that thing in stores? It’s got to sell out. How do they keep it in stores?'”
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Typically it is Smart who is giving out a lesson to his players either in the film room, on the practice field or during the game. But that wasn’t the case here, as the roles were reversed as Smart learned that one doesn’t need to go to GameStop anymore to purchase video games and instead can purchase them digitally.
“And Mykel and Malachi just fell out laughing. They’re like, ‘Coach, they don’t sell those things in stores anymore. They’re not in stores.’ And I was so embarrassed, but I was glad they got a kick out of that. It made me realize how out of touch I actually am with how far things have come. You can just download it and go play. It’s that simple. So the stores don’t have to keep it.”
Smart is entering his ninth season in Athens at the helm of the Georgia program. In that time, the former Saban assistant has turned Georgia into one of the premier college football programs in the country as displayed by his 94-16 overall record and leading the Bulldogs to back-to-back College Football Playoff national championship titles.
This article originally appeared on Athens Banner-Herald: Kirby Smart shares story ‘about College Football 25’ at SEC Media Day
Athens Banner-Herald
