Are NCAA spring football games between two opponents closer to reality?
Second-year Syracuse coach Fran Brown thinks so, though Brown playfully insists perhaps the idea should have come first from the ... older guard of college coaches, such as North Carolina's Bill Belichick -- a first-year, first-time college head coach -- and Boston College skipper Bill O'Brien.
"We should have just told Coach Belichick and Bill O'Brien to come up with it, and they would have let them do it," Brown told reporters. "And then it would have all went, right? We shouldn't have been the first two dudes to say it ... you know damn well that wasn't about to let Coach Primetime and Fran Brown be the first two guys to do it. Over their dead bodies, so that wasn't happening that way.
"I'm just messing with you NCAA, so don't get all mad and call up my A.D. and try to fine me. I'm literally joking. But, I think that they're headed in the right direction, right, and they had all the right reasons. It wouldn't have gave everybody the same opportunity, right? It would have been a little of an advantage and it wasn't about us being able to practice because us practicing together would have only limited the amount of people on the field. It would have been 11 on the field now instead of, well, we go two-spot, so it's 44. Instead of that, it would have been 11 going at a time."
Brown still believes the spring exhibition concept, which surged into the national college football spotlight last month after Deion Sanders spoke openly about finding a foe for his Colorado Buffaloes to scrimmage this spring and Brown quickly sent the message that his Syracuse squad would oblige.
Brown even had a full plan to fly the Syracuse team out to Boulder, Colorado and spend a trio of days together, culminating the time with a spring exhibition contest at Folsom Field. The NCAA recently shot down the idea, which had quickly seen Oklahoma and Oklahoma State indicate their willingness to participate in a similar event, with other schools also stepping into the picture.
Most coaches and programs indicated they viewed the potential spring showcases as both safer -- injury reductions cut in half for each team, because it would only have 11 players on the field at a time -- and as a potential financial boon for Name, Image and Likeness fundraising efforts.
Deion Sanders and Brown had both stressed a life-education component for the planned time together for their players.
"The financial literacy stuff that me and Coach Prime was talking about being able to do would have been something that these kids took with them for a long time," said Brown, a 10-game winner at Syracuse in 2024 in his first season, "and then we were going to have it set up where our study hall was going to be together and guys were just going to be in there doing work and things of that nature. We were trying to build a full family more so than just oh the spring game is going to do that."
Brown did emphasize that the spring game would have turned into an "event" and said he did believe they could happen in 2026.
"That would have been a cool event at the spring game but it was more so, this spring ball thing, everyone's trying to fade away from it, they don't want everyone to see it," he said. "So we're trying to bring some light to it to say hey this is a huge event, right? This would have been a huge fight going on [from a marketing and promotions standpoint], you'd have been able to see us play them on April 18, the day before Easter, in Colorado. That thing would have sold out. Now, you could have been able to look forward to that. You could get Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, like those dudes aren't all from the same conference. But you can get all them now to start playing each other and doing different things like that. I think that would be amazing if we start doing that. I heard Temple and Penn State was trying.
"It was just a good deal to have people go and do it, right? We'll see how it goes. I think we've opened it up. And, it should happen next year. It should be cool."
Instead, Syracuse will play its spring intrasquad exhibition game April 12 inside its dome stadium and Colorado will host its Black & Gold Game at Folsom Field April 19, the day it wanted to host the Orange.