CAMELLIA BOWL '22: Buffalo invites cold weather to Montgomery
Coach Maurice Linguist and the Buffalo Bulls made it to Montgomery despite rough weather in the northeast. The team left 12 hours early to avoid being snowed in. (Tim Gayle)
By GRAHAM DUNN
When Georgia Southern and Buffalo take the field on Tuesday in the ninth-annual Camellia Bowl, pregame predictions had the temperature hovering between 35-40 degrees at kickoff.
That’s no big deal to the Bulls, who live and breathe this kind of weather for much of the season.
But don’t underestimate its value.
Value?
“A lot of NFL teams are in this type of weather,” stated Buffalo’s second-year coach Maurice Linguist, a native of Texas. “I just think you have to have an element of mental toughness. In the south you deal with 100-degree weather. It’s a different element. It’s all about how you handle adversity.”
The entire country has been under a record-breaking cold spell the last few days with temps dipping well below 0 in all parts of the country. As the two teams arrived late Thursday and Friday, the temperature was in the teens with wind chills in single digits in the Capital City.
The Bulls had to move up its arrival time in Montgomery due to a blizzard back in Buffalo. Had the team left at its scheduled time on Friday, chances are their arrival would have postponed possibly to Monday as the airport in Buffalo is currently closed.
As of Monday afternoon, the airport was still inoperable due to bad weather.
“There were a lot of people who were working with us to make it possible to move up our flight,” Linguist said. “From our friends here in Montgomery, to the airlines and so many others, we’re grateful for the work done to make it possible to get here today.”
This wasn’t the first time weather had an affect on Buffalo’s schedule. Prior to the game with Akron scheduled on Nov. 19, a blizzard shut down all activity in the area, including the NFL Bills’ game, which moved to Detroit.
Linguist and Bulls’ officials had to make the difficult choice of moving the game or postponing it. The problem was, Buffalo was in the middle of a race for the MAC East division title and if the game was not played, the chances of a trip to the MAC championship ended.
“We talked about that and sometimes you have to make tough choices,” Linguist said. “Leading up to that game, there were so many scenarios. It was about the conference title. It was about bowl eligibility.
"I was on the phone with ADs and trying to decide what to do. We knew the game would be postponed. A lot of things were moving at once. We tried to stay poised at the moment.”
It turned out that Buffalo was not able to stay in the race for the division and the game was moved to the Saturday normally reserved for conference championship games.
While Toledo and Ohio were playing for the MAC championship, Buffalo was beating Akron on the last play of the game to become bowl eligible.
Despite traditional weather issues, Buffalo continues to be a factor in the MAC. Prior to last season’s disappointing 4-8 record, the young Bulls had earned bowl bids three straight years, including a trip to Montgomery in 2020.
Linguist, who arrived in Buffalo after stints as an assistant at Michigan, Texas A&M and the Dallas Cowboys, was quick to point out that the homes of the players roster that hail from the South.
“You talk to a young man from Georgia, Florida or here in Alabama, which we have on our roster… they come up to Buffalo and they know it will get cold up there,” he said. “It gets cold in the NFL (cities). It’s something that is real and you will have to deal with in your journey.
“You don’t pick your university based on weather. It’s a realistic thing. Pick based on what best suits you as a player.”
Current Georgia Southern quarterback Kyle Vantrease began his college career at Buffalo, which is just three hours from his home in Stow, Ohio. Cold weather wasn’t much of a factor when he chose to be a Bull but he also admits the warmer climate came into play when he decided to transfer.
“The weather is similar to what I grew up in. But I was ready for a little change of scenery,” Vantrease said when explaining his move to Georgia. “It’s 100 degrees in the summer but I can play golf in March and April.
“You can spin the ball in whatever weather. But as far as living, I rather be in the severe heat. When we left Statesboro (on Friday) it was 44 degrees and that is as cold as its been there in a while.”
More than likely, the weather will have little to do with who wins Tuesday’s matchup at Cramton Bowl (11 a.m. kickoff). But Buffalo will have at least one factor in its favor - the Bulls should feel right at home.
“We are not (ready to play with our shirts off),”Linguist said with a laugh. “That’s the job of our strength staff. They aren’t allowed to wear shirts in this weather.”