Last year we wrote that many people, including sports editor Jim Welch of USA TODAY, were getting sick of Steve Spurrier automatically voting Duke at No. 25 in the preseason coaches’ poll. Well, apparently “some people” turned into “pretty much everyone,” as THE GREENVILLE NEWS reports that Spurrier finally relented and left the Blue Devils out of this year’s poll.

Spurrier’s reasons for adding Duke to his ballot every year are noble enough: Duke gave him his first college coaching job, after losing his USFL gig when the league folded. But American Football Coaches Association executive director Grant Teaff personally asked Spurrier to stop the practice, because he was damaging the “integrity” of the poll. Read more…