For a few minutes in a news conference on Saturday, South Carolina tight end Kiel Pollard got real.
He showed a side of college football. A different perspective from the one most folks see, an emotional window into the behind the scenes struggles many players work their way through.
“What a lot of folks don’t see is when players leave high school, they leave as gods,” Pollard said. “When they go to college, it’s so hard for them to get on the field. It just takes so much support. I got so much support from my teammates, from people back home, my parents, and that’s what you really need.