Former Florida State coach Bobby Bowden is glad to be No. 2 behind Joe Paterno again after the NCAA restored the late Penn State coach's vacated victories.
The NCAA and Penn State reached a settlement Friday in a lawsuit that challenged the legality of the consent decree used to sanction the school in 2012 for the Jerry Sandusky child-molestation scandal.
The NCAA agreed to restore the 111 victories that had been removed from Paterno's record, giving him 409 again. Bowden is second on the list with 377, though he also has had 12 victories vacated.
"That's OK," the 85-year-old Bowden told The Associated Press in a phone interview Friday about no longer holding the record. "I'm glad for him. I was self-conscious about that anyway.
"Every time I would speak they would say, 'He's the winningest coach in I-A history.' I'd say, 'Yeah, after they took 100 away from Joe.'"
Bowden said that while he doesn't know all the details about what went on at Penn State with the Sandusky scandal, it seemed to him the NCAA punishment of Paterno was too harsh.
"I felt like that was pretty dadgum strict," Bowden said.
The NCAA stripped Bowden and Florida State of 12 victories from the 2006 and '07 seasons because of NCAA violations related to an academic cheating scandal.
"By the way, am I going to get my 12 back now?" Bowden said.