College football world says goodbye as Lee Corso retires from GameDay

For nearly 40 years, Lee Corso was synonymous with college football. As the heart and soul of ESPN's College GameDay, he helped turn an ordinary studio show into a national phenomenon, a traveling carnival that understood and embraced everything that made the sport so special.

But now, that sport will have to go on without him, as Corso announced his decision to retire on Thursday morning.

Corso was college football's perfect spokesman, a former head coach at Louisville, Indiana and Northern Illinois who combined a deep understanding of strategy with an equally deep love for the regional specificity that sets the sport apart. Wherever College GameDay traveled in a given week, Corso seemed thrilled to be there, eager to soak up the peculiarities — and, often, the live animals —that made that place unique.

Unfortunately, Corso's health began to noticeably decline in recent years, ever since suffering a stroke back in May of 2009. It became clear that he simply couldn't shoulder the load that he used to; he would often disappear from the GameDay set for an hour or two at a time, reappearing just in time to make his much-beloved headgear pick. Corso is finally ready to ride off into the sunset at age 89, and ESPN is giving him one more chance to charm us all before he does: His final GameDay broadcast will take place during Week 1 of the 2025 season, per an announcement on Thursday.

GameDay, and college football itself, will go on without him. But it won't quite feel the same — as the outpouring of affection on social media in the wake of Corso's retirement proved.

Tributes pour in as Lee Corso retires from College GameDay

Of course, if you want to really understand what Corso meant to college football and the people he touched, just listen to the tribute that longtime colleague Rece Davis posted on X.

And Davis was hardly the only one. Across the internet, college football fans, media members and even coaches and players expressed their gratitude for everything that Corso has meant over the years.