http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20...4.facebook

Quote:For all Larry and Tony Luppi knew, they were about to meet an untimely end at the hands of a kidnapper wearing Clemson gear.

Luckily for the two brothers, Clemson offensive line coach Robbie Caldwell, not a man with bad intentions, was in the right place at the right time to rescue the stranded Notre Dame fans during a driving rainstorm in the wee hours Sunday morning.

Quote:After Clemson’s 24-22 win went final at 11:42 p.m., the Luppis’ plan was to ride a shuttle back to their hotel in Seneca and drive their rental car to Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport in time to catch a 7:30 a.m. Sunday flight.

“Obviously, we were saddened by the outcome,” Tony said by phone Tuesday. “But to be honest after this whole incident, I got over this loss so much faster than I normally would.”

They never saw the shuttle, and traffic was impossibly congested due to the exodus of fans trying to escape the weather. So the Luppis began hiking in the dark and the rain.

“We’re the most conservative guys. We didn’t have anything to drink the whole day, totally sober,” Tony said. “As we’re running alongside the highway, Larry’s going, ‘you realize these cars can spin out of control and hit us?’ I’m thinking, ‘how would we ever explain this to our loved ones, or how would someone piece this all together?’”

According to MapQuest, their rental car at the hotel was 9.75 miles west of Memorial Stadium.

Quote:After dodging traffic to cross busy Highway 123, they found a convenience store a mile and a half from Memorial Stadium and called for a taxi driver, one who wouldn’t arrive anywhere close to the time promised.

While the Luppis waited, close to 2 a.m., a man in a Clemson hat and polo shirt filling up on gas and fetching a Dr. Pepper passed the Notre Dame supporters in the store.

“Honestly, when he walked past us, I thought he was just a fan,” Tony said. “On his way out, he asked, ‘Do you guys know where you’re going?’ I said, ‘Actually, we’re waiting on a cab, but we’ll pay you for a ride.’”

The man invited the Luppis to hop in his Chevy Suburban, but he said, “that (back) door don’t work — you ride up with me in the front.’”

Tony and Larry looked nervously at one another.

“Larry goes, ‘that’s like a kidnapper’s dream,’ ” Tony recalled. “We told him our phones were dead, no one knows where we are. We gave this guy way too much information about ourselves.”

“At this point,” Larry said, “I start thinking I should text my mom goodbye and tell her I love her and my family.”

The driver began making small talk — “Were you at the game? Did you have a great time?” — and eventually, Larry asked what the man did for a living.

“I coach at Clemson,” was the response. According to Tony, “my first thought was, ‘he coaches baseball or rugby or lacrosse or something.’ So he asked Caldwell what he coached.

“Oh, I coach the offensive line,” Caldwell said.

After reaching the hotel, Caldwell gave the Luppis directions to return to the highway toward Atlanta, stayed until their rental car started and refused to accept any compensation.

The men made their flight on time.

Quote:Tony added Saturday night’s game was the loudest and best environment he’d ever attended, including Notre Dame’s 2012 win at Oklahoma. The brothers said “there wasn’t one person the entire trip” who gave them grief for wearing Notre Dame jerseys, and they won’t soon forget their Good Samaritan.

“It was such a cool moment,” Tony said. “I’ll be rooting for Clemson from now on. Not only because of him, but the hospitality of everybody in Clemson.”

The ND message boards are full of posts regarding how well Irish fans were treated at Clemson.

It was a also a nice touch for Clemson to honor the four Irish fans who died earlier last Saturday in a private plane crash while flying down for the game.

I hope that Clemson fans are treated to similar hospitality in 2020 when Clemson travels to ND.

Games at Clemson are always a great experience.

Unlike what the Media always tries to paint the South, It's still the Best place in America to raise a family. Way to Rep Clemson ! Even in the face of recent South Carolina tragedies, You never see SC folks blaming the Government or others for Their woes.

(10-08-2015 08:04 AM)CardFan1 Wrote:  Unlike what the Media always tries to paint the South, It's still the Best place in America to raise a family. Way to Rep Clemson ! Even in the face of recent South Carolina tragedies, You never see SC folks blaming the Government or others for Their woes.:bow:

Except for Lindsay Graham being a damn hypocrite, I would agree with you.

He voted against and tried to block federal funds for New Jersey after Hurricane Sandy, but now wants a billion federal dollars for South Carolina.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...Sandy.html

(10-08-2015 10:05 AM)TerryD Wrote:  

(10-08-2015 08:04 AM)CardFan1 Wrote:  Unlike what the Media always tries to paint the South, It's still the Best place in America to raise a family. Way to Rep Clemson ! Even in the face of recent South Carolina tragedies, You never see SC folks blaming the Government or others for Their woes.:bow:

Except for Lindsay Graham being a damn hypocrite, I would agree with you.

He voted against and tried to block federal funds for New Jersey after Hurricane Sandy, but now wants a billion federal dollars for South Carolina.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...Sandy.html

I hate to defend Lindsey but what these articles fail to mention was the immense amount of unrelated pork attached to the Sandy emergency funding bill.

http://nypost.com/2012/12/15/obama-sandy...rm-damage/

Quote:The pork-barrel feast includes more than $8 million to buy cars and equipment for the Homeland Security and Justice departments. It also includes a whopping $150 million for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to dole out to fisheries in Alaska and $2 million for the Smithsonian Institution to repair museum roofs in DC.
An eye-popping $13 billion would go to “mitigation” projects to prepare for future storms.
Other big-ticket items in the bill include $207 million for the VA Manhattan Medical Center; $41 million to fix up eight military bases along the storm’s path, including Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; $4 million for repairs at Kennedy Space Center in Florida; $3.3 million for the Plum Island Animal Disease Center and $1.1 million to repair national cemeteries.

What pork will Lindsay try to attach to the South Carolina bill?

(10-08-2015 06:05 AM)TerryD Wrote:  The ND message boards are full of posts regarding how well Irish fans were treated at Clemson.

It was a also a nice touch for Clemson to honor the four Irish fans who died earlier last Saturday in a private plane crash while flying down for the game.

I hope that Clemson fans are treated to similar hospitality in 2020 when Clemson travels to ND.

Your fears were just that, fears.......another hurdle has been crossed toward, well you know.

(10-08-2015 08:04 AM)CardFan1 Wrote:  Unlike what the Media always tries to paint the South, It's still the Best place in America to raise a family. Way to Rep Clemson ! Even in the face of recent South Carolina tragedies, You never see SC folks blaming the Government or others for Their woes.

To be fair there are GREAT places to raise a child all across this GREAT Country of ours, the south is definitely "Old School" that is for sure, which has it's Positive's and Negatives......

But Clemson and it's fans are ALL Aces across any board.
FLossY Out...

(10-08-2015 10:20 AM)TerryD Wrote:  What pork will Lindsay try to attach to the South Carolina bill?

We can only hope...

So, in other words the Clemson OL coach gave two woebegone ND fans a ride back to their hotel?

That is an absolutely amazing story of human compassion! He could have let those two Irish a-holes rot in a convenience store for a few hours while they waited for their taxi cab to arrive but, no, that's not how he rolls. He told them to hop in his car and he whisked them to safety.

What a humanitarian! I'm not a fan of either school but I would like to send him a thank you note on behalf of the human race. Maybe Tom Rinaldi can do a tear-jerking feature on that touching moment? I'm going to shoot him a DM about this whole saga.

(10-08-2015 08:04 AM)CardFan1 Wrote:  Unlike what the Media always tries to paint the South, It's still the Best place in America to raise a family. Way to Rep Clemson ! Even in the face of recent South Carolina tragedies, You never see SC folks blaming the Government or others for Their woes.

Yeah, the south is a great place to raise your family…provided you are white...and a Christian…and not that candy ass Catholicism with their socialist pope. I'm talking about real Christianity. The kind that has a youth pastor who plays acoustic guitar and sings songs about how cool it is to love Jesus.

(10-08-2015 11:59 AM)XLance Wrote:  

(10-08-2015 06:05 AM)TerryD Wrote:  The ND message boards are full of posts regarding how well Irish fans were treated at Clemson.

It was a also a nice touch for Clemson to honor the four Irish fans who died earlier last Saturday in a private plane crash while flying down for the game.

I hope that Clemson fans are treated to similar hospitality in 2020 when Clemson travels to ND.

Your fears were just that, fears.......another hurdle has been crossed toward, well you know.

What "fears" would that be?

(10-08-2015 01:19 PM)Dr. Isaly von Yinzer Wrote:  So, in other words the Clemson OL coach gave two woebegone ND fans a ride back to their hotel?

That is an absolutely amazing story of human compassion! He could have let those two Irish a-holes rot in a convenience store for a few hours while they waited for their taxi cab to arrive but, no, that's not how he rolls. He told them to hop in his car and he whisked them to safety.

What a humanitarian! I'm not a fan of either school but I would like to send him a thank you note on behalf of the human race. Maybe Tom Rinaldi can do a tear-jerking feature on that touching moment? I'm going to shoot him a DM about this whole saga.

Let it go, man. Let it go.