They met at Briarcrest High School, back before either one of them had become a household name, back before "The Blind Side" and before the wins over Alabama and before the fame and the riches and before the fall.
Sean Tuohy coached the eighth grade boys basketball team at Briarcrest. Hugh Freeze coached the high school girls team at Briarcrest.
“They’d scrimmage us,” Tuohy said. “We became friends.”
And that relationship explains why Tuohy isn’t going to join in the national pummeling of Freeze in the wake of the Ole Miss football coach's resignation for a “patten of personal misconduct” that includes at least one call to an escort service.
“I’m never going to stop being his friend,” Tuohy said. "I’m never going to stop loving him. When he needs me, I’ll be there.”
►What we know:Hugh Freeze resigns as Ole Miss head coach
►Calkins:Hugh Freeze brought down by hubris, vengeance and sex
Tuohy doesn’t say this with any sort of defiance or bitterness. He doesn’t begrudge people their opinions or even their jokes.
“I don’t take issue with other people saying ugly things,” he said. “That’s their business. I don’t read something ugly and want to call the guy and say, `You should really get to know him.’ If someone wants to have an opinion, fine.
“But that’s that’s not my job. I’m not a newspaper reporter, I don’t work for Ole Miss. I don’t take any pleasure in other people’s misery. If this washappening to (Mississippi State coach) Dan Mullen I’d be no more interested in the personal stuff than I am right now. I don’t like bad things happening to anyone. I loved Hugh four weeks ago and I’ll love him four weeks from now.”
Tuohy — who was a four-time all-SEC basketball player at Ole Miss — actually met Freeze because his daughter was cheering for the boys eighth gradeteam at Briarcrest.
“They were terrible,” he said. “I said, `If I’m going to have watch that many games, I’m going to coach the team myself.’ ”
The eighth grade team got better. Freeze and Tuohy became fast friends. Freeze asked Tuohy to help coach the football team as well.
“The first football game I ever went to, I said, `This guy’s different,’” Tuohy said. “I thought he was one of the smartest people I'd ever met. Hugh is a phenomenal coach.”
The rest, you may have seen in the movie theater. The Tuohys took in and helped raise Michael Oher. Oherhelped win a championship for Freeze and Briarcrest. Oher went on to play in the NFL; Freeze went on to coach at Ole Miss.
Now Oher — who is in the NFL’s concussion protocol — has been released by the Carolina Panthers and sued by an Uber driver. Oherwas actually released the same day Freeze resigned.
More:Hearing delayed for ex-Titan Michael Oher accused in Uber driver assault
“I honestly don’t want to know everything people are saying,” Tuohy said. “It is a little bit head-in-the-sand, I’m not trying to deny that. But that’s what I choose. It’s not going to change my feeling about my friend if I have all of the facts or none of the facts, so that’s what I’m choosing to do.”
Tuohy does know that some have been calling Freeze a “fraud” because of the coach’s public religious beliefs. He respectfully disagrees with that.
“In the spiritual sense that Hugh and I believe in, we don’t get to Heaven by the good things we do on this earth, and we don’t go to Hell because of the bad things we do on this earth. We go to Heaven because Jesus died on the cross to forgive our sins.
“People probably say I’m a fraud. It’s a crazy world right now. After what we’ve been exposed to for the last nine years (here Tuohy is referring to those who those who criticized his family in the wake of "The Blind Side") you become a little more appreciative of not caring what people say.”
As for whether Tuohythinks Freeze will coach again?
“I guarantee it,” he said. “There’s not many that can coach as good as him, and that’s what he’s meant to be.”
In the meantime, Tuohy figures he'll keepit simple. He’llsupporthis friend because that’s what friends should do.
“You just don’t give up on people and I’m not giving up on Hugh,” he said. “It’s not any fun for any of us. But feeling sorry for him is not what I'm going to do. It’s been a bad week. That doesn’t mean it has to be a bad life.”
