GREENVILLE, S.C. -- After Texas clinched its spot in the SEC tournament title game, where it will face three-time champ South Carolina, Longhorns coach Vic Schaefer asked to end his news conference with one final comment.
He wanted to praise host city Greenville.
Schaefer has been outspoken about wanting to rotate the SEC tournament to different host sites, considering Greenville is about 100 miles from the University of South Carolina and the Gamecocks always have a heavy crowd presence at their tournament games.
"I want to commend Greenville," Schaefer said after Texas beat Ole Miss 85-68 in the semifinals Saturday night to clinch its spot in the final. "This place does a great job with this event. I've been getting crushed, apparently, my wife tells me on social media about my comments about having to play here in the tournament."
Last month, Schaefer was asked following a home win against Georgia, whether it was an unfair advantage for South Carolina to have the tournament in its home state.
"From a conference tournament standpoint, we all know when they play, they're going to have six, 7,000 people there and you're talking about us here in Austin having to go all the way to the East Coast," Schaefer said. "We used to have it in Nashville every now and then -- now it's just out there. It's a long way to go for us. It's a long way to go for our fans.
"The part that's problematic is Greenville does such a great job, and they bid on it and it's about money so at the end of the day our kids are the ones that suffer from that. ... Would I like to see it in San Antonio? Sure, I'd love to. But other people are going to have to step up and bid on it because right now Greenville's the one that writes the check, and they do a great job."
Schaefer was also quoted earlier this week implying that South Carolina has an unfair advantage.
"It's not really that big of a feat if you have it in your backyard every year," he said. "That's really hard for the rest of us."
Texas lost to South Carolina last year in the SEC tournament final and split both meetings with the Gamecocks earlier this year. South Carolina has made seven straight SEC tournament championship game appearances.
When asked during her news conference to put into context how difficult it has been to continue to play for SEC championships given the expectations and overall strength of the SEC as a whole, South Carolina coach Dawn Staley said, "Some coaches may say and the location, right?" before answering the question.
Clearly what Schaefer said has not gone unnoticed. While he did praise Greenville in his initial comments last month, his more pointed comments about the advantage South Carolina gets playing here went viral. Schaefer pointed out that he has gone running through downtown Greenville the past few days and has enjoyed the scenic views of the Swamp Rabbit Trail.
"They do a great job here," Schaefer said Saturday night. "I just want to make sure that they know how much we appreciate their energy and their effort to put on this event. My comments have nothing to do with Greenville. Greenville has done an amazing job."