Thursday marked the beginning of a long goodbye as Lee Corso isn’t quite done yet, but the end is in sight. ESPN announced that Corso will officially retire from College GameDay following Week 1 of the 2025 season. He’ll get one final fall sendoff, one more shot at the headgear routine that’s become as integral to college football Saturdays as kickoff itself. The network now faces tough decisions, such as whether to continue the tradition he made iconic or let it retire with him, and perhaps even tougher — where to host his final GameDay appearance.
Already bracing for change, the sports world began paying tribute to one of the sport’s most cherished voices, as did Scott Van Pelt.
1️⃣ BIG THING: Lee Corso 🐐 @notthefakeSVP on how one legend reshaped college football Saturdays 🏈 pic.twitter.com/3LEKQgKQRW
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) April 18, 2025
“For nearly 30 years, if you loved college football, you had one essential duty on a given Saturday in the fall: to be in front of your television just before noon eastern to see who Lee’s going to pick,” Van Pelt remarked on Thursday’s SportsCenter. “In this age of DVRs, that moment became the last thing you truly had to see live, because it’s magic, it’s electric. Watching it later would’ve felt like cheating.” He emphasized that “at its core, it’s simply a man putting on a muppet head, but it was Coach — the man who gracefully aged into becoming everyone’s dad, then grandpa, and beloved friend. You wanted him to pick your team, but it was even more exhilarating when he reeled you in before going heel, drawing tens of thousands of fans in — there was nothing like it, and there’s nothing like him either. He is singular.”
There’s no replacing him, which led Awful Announcing’s Matt Yoder to argue that they shouldn’t.
“Lee Corso is an absolute icon and star, who will bid farewell to an adoring legion of fans at the end of August as the college football season kicks off,” Van Pelt continued. “As this news became public, you felt an avalanche of love on social media, a rare sight indeed. Lee melts away cynicism with the warmth he has provided viewers for decades, and that love is genuine. Having been lucky enough to be a small part of the show more than a decade ago, I can attest that the love of the GameDay family is even stronger, with Coach always being the patriarch. The sincere affection shared amongst colleagues like Chris Fowler and Rece Davis, as well as others like David Pollack, Desmond Howard, Pat McAfee, The Bear (Chris Fallica), and Stanford Steve, is reflected today. Yet, the cherished relationship is undeniably between Coach and Herbie, filled with sincerity, tenderness, and appreciation that has only deepened over time.”
Time marches on. “I think of the old Bob Seger line, ‘30 years, where’d they go? 30 years. I don’t know. I sit and I wonder sometimes where they’ve gone.’ GameDay has traveled across the country on a joyride, and Lee, you have made it exhilarating. We celebrate one last ride. The place you occupy in the hearts of college football fans will never belong to anyone else. There will be one more pick, one more mascot head, one more Saturday morning where fans across the nation pause, not just to see who Lee Corso chooses, but to say thank you. Thank you for the laughs, the chaos, the curveballs, and the heart. The man who brought endless joy to college football will take his final bow this fall, and if anyone captured what that means, it was Scott Van Pelt’s heartfelt reflection on Thursday’s SportsCenter.
