Everything defensive line coach Travian Robertson said about South Carolina spring practice

South Carolina defensive line coach Travian Robertson, who was injured in a serious car accident last year, spoke to the media for the first time since then on Monday. Here’s everything he had to say

How good did it feel to be back on the field after last summer and a long offseason?

“With everything that happened to me last summer, you take things for granted. To be back on my feet, coaching again, it feels good. Because when I was in an accident, the first thing I asked the doctor who was helping me was, ‘When can I walk again?’ The first time I woke up from my first surgery, the first thing I asked him was, ‘When can I get back to work?’ We got great doctors, great support staff, and everything that can help me get healthy and come back on time. It felt great. Sometimes I wake up, and I’m surprised that I’m able to be doing what I’m doing. So it’s a blessing to be able to be back with my guys and back with the team.”

How pleased were you last season with the results you got from your guys?

“It was hard for me because I’m very passionate about this program. I’m very passionate about coaching. So it was hard to watch. I think that I texted Coach (Shane) Beamer. But I’m a big believer in suffer equals success. Just to know that we were going through a hard time that we suffered last year. The only thing I could think of is the positive things coming for us. I started with my accident and having bad things happen to me right before the season. just to see everything that happened to us the whole the entire time, I was thinking about the future, and I was thinking about 2026. We’re going to be better just because of all the hard times that we’re going through now.

Your GamecockCentral membership starts at just $1 – and we’ll throw in a complimentary year of access to The Athletic.

“I hope everyone in this program learned from it. I hope everyone understands that you have to go through hard times. And, we were the team that went through it, starting with me. It was hard, but just knowing that suffering equals success, we were going to do everything we could to be successful this year. To see what Coach Beamer has done with the staff and to see what we have done with our roster, things are moving in the right direction so far.”

How challenging was it to get past the accident and everything that was involved?

“My main focus was, I had to remind myself. And I had to remind everyone else I was a father and a husband before I ever became a coach. To think about just getting back to work, it would be selfish of me. My main focus during the accidents was just getting back to my family. That was one thing that I always tell my players. The ultimate thing that we try to do is just make a home for our family. So that night, I was not able to make it home. And so I had it as hard as it was, really, and dropped everything that dealt with my career and just focused on getting healthy, and focused on just going back to my family. That part was hard. Because you have so much passion for the game. I knew that I had to rely on my family and my faith during that time/ That’s what I just buckled down to. I tapped into my career every now and then when I felt like it. But my most important thing was with health and family during that time.”

Take us through your time at the hospital. How many days and surgeries did you have to go through before you could get out?

“I was in the hospital for a total of 12 to 14 days. I think I had a total of six surgeries. I was technically supposed to have everything done in two weeks, but the surgery was so bad that they recommended that I go to rehab. I wanted to be with my family. I knew I was going to rehab the way I was supposed to. I decided to do my rehab at home instead of going to the facility every day, which worked out for me. The shape that I was in. I didn’t feel like getting into a car. It was about three months that I couldn’t walk, and I couldn’t do anything. I had a lot of lower body. When you have your foundation, you can’t walk in, and then your core, you can imagine that I was just sitting there for almost three months. And, eventually, my instincts of being a hard worker kicked in while I was in the hospital because my body was still scheduled to wake up at 5:30 in the morning to work out.

“I was told not to lift no more than five pounds, but I said, ‘Get me some Gatorade,’ and I started lifting Gatorade bottles. It was hard. I think I was prepared for it because of all the things that I went through. I always told my players that being in the trenches every day we made contact is almost like being in a little fender bender accident. That was a major accident. I just worked hard. I had two ACL surgeries and remember the hard process it takes to get through that. So I just buckled down and rehabbed the best way I could so I can get back as quickly as I can.”

What do you remember about being back at the facility for the first time after everything? And how much are you able to do now?

“I’ll never forget the first time I wanted to come by the facility. I had a doctor’s appointment. I told my wife, ‘Just drive me by. Just let me go by.’ And I texted the guys, I was like, ‘Hey, man, I cannot come inside, but I would love to see y’all.’ To have the entire staff come up to the car and greet me in the car, it just motivated me to do more. I remember just driving by there; everyone saw me, and I didn’t have the energy to get out. The next week, it just motivated me to do more. I told my wife I wanted to go up and be a part of it now. Knowing that I was going through a lot of hard problems and the team was going through a lot of hard things, that we were still a family, and just to see that when I walked in the building, they just erased everything, and it was like, ‘Hey, let’s go love on Travian, let’s go love on T-Rob.’

“That means a lot to me because, in this business, you can be selfish in only working and focus on wins and losses. But that made me feel special because I felt alone during that time and felt like I was the only one dealing with it. But they showed me they were missing me. So I felt really good, and it just motivated me to come up even more. So it went from one day to two days, and then my wife was like, ‘Oh, all right, we’ve got to slow it down.’ So, it just motivated me to get back to them, help them out.”

Did any doubt ever creep in that life would never be the same?

“Initially, yeah. I relied on my faith. Honestly, I’ll tell the story that when they lay me on a stretcher, when I finally got out of the car, I don’t know what it was, but it came over me that I was going to be all right. I relied on my faith and trusted the doctors at the time, and everything they told me, it happened. There wasn’t one thing that told me, ‘Hey, if we do this, this may happen.’ It was as if we did this, and you do everything you’re supposed to do, this is what will happen. I relied on faith and never thought about the negatives or what could come. I just felt that God had me. I just went with that. I learned this from old staff, they always told us positives, stay positive, and negatives stay negative. And I had to remind myself of that in the hospital.

“If I had ever dealt with anything negative in the hospital, I would try to turn it into something positive. Because if I stay negative, it will become a negative situation. So the whole accident was negative. I try to do my best to make every day a positive day for me.”

Do you think you’re an inspirational story to your players, and do you want to be an inspirational story?

“You never really want to go through those hard times just to be a story. I think that God used me to be that story for them. I don’t wake up and say, Give me something so I can be an inspiration. I don’t want to go through that. I do believe that I was used in that way. Whatever God’s purpose for me is, I use it in that way. I do believe that they love me, and they respect me to know that you know, I went through something that I can use my story to help them. I don’t wake up and say, give me something so I can use that as an inspiration for the guys. It’s very important to me that I stand strong for things that are happening in life, other than football. So they can see that we are human beings. We all go through things, and everything will not be peaches and cream. We have to figure it out.

“I thank God that He gave me the strength that I can show them. Things may not be good right now, but if you follow the process, it will be good for you. Just having them around. They motivated me a lot. They came to the hospital, and they came and visited me. They understand that life will happen, and it takes a family. I appreciate them a lot because they weren’t expecting it like I was. And they loved me. They care for me. They call my wife, they do. It was like the whole community came together to help me. So I really do appreciate all of you.”

[SPRING SALE: Get 50% OFF GamecockCentral + On3 + Rivals!]

How does your faith translate through your process of forgiveness?

“My brother, all my family asked me how I felt. I forgive with love. I know I cannot move on and be at peace. You never know what people are going through. Immediately, I told them a lot of people didn’t understand because a lot of people hated that it happened to me. But I explained to my brother, as he was spending time in the hospital, that I had to find a way to forgive because I had no idea what was going on, and all I knew was that it was an accident and the results.

“I was just glad I was alive and able to forgive. So immediately, I told my brother I was like, I forgave him. he was like, I’m angry right now. And I said, ‘Look, man, you can’t say you forgive, and you still hate.’ At this point in time, in order for me to move on and be at peace with this, I had to immediately forgive with love. And I was at peace. I was at a point, now let’s just give me up so I can get back to work. I immediately knew what I had to do to move in the right direction. If it were different, if I had a lot of hate with my forgiveness, I would not be standing here right now talking to y’all because I would be dealing with a lot.

“I knew what I wanted to do in life. I knew that it was an accident, and I knew God had me. So I forgave him and moved on. I needed to do that for me to be here today.”

How do you feel about how far Nick Barrett came from deciding to redshirt to putting together that season?

“That was important to me, and I immediately thought that because of the conversation Nick and I had when it came to him deciding to redshirt and come back. I was sitting and thinking that this will be very important for us. Nick was a leader for us last year. When I got into an accident, he called me every Sunday as we played on Saturday. Nick and I had an hour to 45 minute conversation. My message to Nick was that he was prepared for it, like, coach, I want to finish my senior season with you coaching me.

“I said, ‘Nick, you’re prepared, you’re ready. I know you feel like you’re alone during this because I’m not here.’ But I was like, ‘You’re ready.’ To see him, what he did. I really, really appreciate him. Because it was hard knowing that. I’ll stay because I want to be coached by you, coach, and finish my last season. And all of a sudden, you’re not here with me. That was hard for me, knowing that Nick and I had that conversation. The biggest thing I appreciate about him is that he graduated. To go through all those phases, and I really hate that we did not send him off with a winning season. But Nick grew as a young man, and he grew as a player. I think that it set him up for the NFL. I think he’s going to be a really, really good player for a long time.”

What was the main thing you were looking for, and what have you seen so far from Jordan (Thomas), Kelby (Collins), and Tomiwa (Durojaiye)?

“It’s hard to replace a lot of guys in this conference with everybody chasing the same size, everybody chasing the same speed, and the same twitching. So, for me, I wanted someone who loved the game. I wanted someone to come in to be a leader. When you have a season, and you try to come back and do better, you need leadership. So we want two guys with experience and who understand that we want to win. So I think that we handpicked our new line and that we got with Jordan, Kelby and Tomiwa.

“So far, those guys have been great. They adjust just really well. they’re doing a really good job on nutrition and on a really good job in the weight room. And now we are practicing on the field. I’ve seen a lot of good things out of them so far. I really like them. Obviously, they’re still adjusting to playbooks, but so far it’s been good for those guys.”

What have you seen so far from Aiden (Harris) and Noah (Clark)?

“Those guys have been working hard. They wanted to be here. We’ve been recruiting Aiden and Noah for a long time now, and it wasn’t really hard with them because they wanted to be here. They weren’t chasing anything but development. It was just relationships. So that made it easy for us to recruit them. Now, when we are coaching them and everything, obviously, they make freshman mistakes. But they are good guys who are showing up on time, doing what they’re supposed to do. They’re being a sponge, just soaking everything in right now.

“Noah is one of our biggest freshmen we’ve signed in a long time. He’s fast, he’s strong. He’s physical. Aiden is a twitchy guy who loves to play football. He has it in his pedigree, but right now, they’re all making freshman mistakes, which we expect. But, so far, so good. We are very impressed with what they are doing. Still a lot of growing to do. They’re not far off. They’re really right where they need to be this spring. So I’m very glad we got them in the spring.”

What are some things you have been working on with Troy (Pikes) to take the next step?

“Each year, we never want a guy to stay the same. We want him to get better. With Troy being an older guy now. Our expectations for him are to be better at everything he does. He has the skill set to be a really good player. He has to do everything off the field and everything on the field. Our expectation for all our guys is to get better every day. So not just with Troy, but all our guys are being expected to all get better.”

How beneficial was it for Gabriel Bronlow-Dindy to get on the field?

“We all know Gabe came from (Texas) A&M, and they had a loaded roster at the time. The opportunity that he had here, like Coach Beamer always talks about, we don’t promise anything. We promised him an opportunity. He took advantage of that. We knew he was strong. We knew he had everything we wanted in a player. Sometimes guys get lost in the sauce with a loaded roster. I feel like he’s free. He can play the way he really wants to play. He played a lot of ball last year. We expect him to step up and leave this place better than when he found it.

How has the transition been with Coach (Deion) Barnes and what do you see from him and what he brings to the position?

“It’s been great. Every year, we may have a coaching change, and a coach goes off and has to do what is best for his family. But I can tell you this: when I got a phone call from Coach Beamer, and he said that we were hiring Deion Barnes, I was excited because the first thing he said was that he reminded me of you. So I was excited because I know how hard I coach, and I know what it takes to play in the trenches in the SEC. So to hear that I was having someone else to be coached with, somebody who would remind me of me.

Working with him, man. He’s great. He brings a lot of energy. He knows the position and play position himself. He’s very demanding so far. So, I love coaching with him; it’s been great since he’s been here.”

The Insiders Forum: Discuss South Carolina football!