DESTIN, Fla. -- You can't call Steve Spurrier the Ol' Ball Coach anymore. The moniker is outdated.

The Ol' Ball Coach made Florida a dominant football power in the 1990s. The Ol' Ball Coach won a national championship and six SEC titles.

The Ol' Ball Coach had more impact on SEC football than anyone since Bear Bryant. And when he left the Gators for the NFL's Washington Redskins after the 2001 season, you probably thought he was gone for good.

You were right.

Never mind that Spurrier has returned to the SEC as the head coach of the South Carolina Gamecocks. He isn't the Ol' Ball Coach anymore. He's more like the young Steve Spurrier. Remember him?

He's the former assistant coach whom two new head coaches didn't bother retaining on their staffs. He's the guy whom at least two SEC schools rejected as a head-coaching candidate in the 1980s. He's the guy who won an Atlantic Coast Conference championship at Duke.

He's the underdog. And Tuesday, on the first day of the SEC spring meetings, he reminded a group of reporters how comfortable he is in that role.

"If I had my choice of every school, South Carolina may be the perfect place for me to coach," he said.

He talked about his familiarity with the conference and the East Division. He praised South Carolina's fan support and facilities. But the clincher wasn't what South Carolina has -- but what it hasn't done.

"South Carolina has not achieved much, as we all know," he said "No divisions, no SEC's (championships). I don't think we've been to a major bowl or top 10s. We've got a lot of room to do things there that have never been done before.

"That's the challenge and the fun part, doing something that's never been done and trying to do things that people say can't be done."

People said you couldn't win at Duke. Spurrier went 15-7-1 there in 1988-89.

Florida had never won an SEC football championship before it hired Spurrier as head coach. He won six in 10 years.

Spurrier didn't just win at Florida. He won by outlandish margins, often needling the losers along the way. He won so much that the challenge of winning became more of a burden than fun.

After all the success at Florida and all the failure in the NFL, Spurrier is ready for a new challenge and the fun that comes with it.

"I set a goal to being the winningest coach in South Carolina history, which means I need 65 wins," he said. "I think it's a doable goal. I want recruits and prospects out there to know I plan on being there seven to 10 years."

You might notice a few more gray hairs than when he last coached in the SEC, but he still has the hairline of a college student. He looks at least 10 years younger than his age and maintains a workout regimen that would challenge someone 20 years younger.

When Spurrier turned 60 this spring, he invited Columbia, S.C., sports columnist Ron Morris to join him for a workout. After four hours, Morris probably felt like Kentucky did after spending an afternoon with Spurrier's Gators.

The workout included 300 situps and 300 pushups. The stationary bike and treadmill were a warmup to the bike ride around Williams-Brice Stadium -- not once, but 60 times.

Conclusion: Spurrier is in better shape than his football program.

The Gamecocks don't have a proven quarterback to run Spurrier's pass-oriented offense. They lack discipline as well as talent, as evidenced by numerous off-the-field incidents in the last six months.

"Do you have a comment on Dustin Lindsey?" a sportswriter asked Spurrier on Tuesday.

"The kid from Mobile?" Spurrier said. "He's got a twin brother, you know. Why just one of them?"

"Well, I understand he (Dustin Lindsey) was arrested," the sportswriter said.

"Whew, I didn't know about that one," Spurrier said. "He get in a fight?

"DUI," the reporter said.

"It's something I didn't know about," Spurrier said. "Was it in the paper?"

The sportswriter handed Spurrier a copy of Tuesday's Mobile Register. The arrest was the lead story in the sports section.

Based on his track record, Spurrier will instill discipline in his players. Based on his track record, he will call plays that will confound defenses.

And based on his track record, he will excel as an underdog.

But this underdog has never chased bigger dogs. Tennessee and Florida are consensus top-10 picks; Georgia's program is much improved over the one that Spurrier handled with ease in the 1990s.

If the challenge is really the fun part, South Carolina should be a blast.