Legendary UGA football coach and athletic director Vince Dooley spoke with Scott Slade Tuesday on Atlanta's Morning News about the Penn State sanctions and how they will impact the school and college football.

Dooley's 1982 UGA team featuring Herschel Walker lost to Penn State in the Sugar Bowl in January of 1983 giving the Nittany Lions and Joe Paterno their first ever NCAA National Championship.

"An unfortunate part of this (report) is that Joe cannot speak, cannot respond to it.  I knew Joe for a long time, knew him as an honorable person," said Dooley. "He made a very serious, serious...you can't overemphasize the serious mistake that he, the athletic director and president obviously made.  And it's just a tragedy in the worst way.  A great tragedy, the worst I've ever heard because it's personal and I know the family involved."

As far as his opinions on the sanctions handed down to Penn State by the NCAA, Dooley said he could not judge the appropriateness of them. 

"I know the NCAA decided, based on institutional control, that they should be involved, and the became involved in a big way.  It's a big blow to the Penn State program, and it will take it some time for it to recover," said Dooley.

When asked about what was worse, the sanctions Penn State received, or getting the "so-called" death penalty, Dooley responded as a former coach and former athletic director.

"Somebody asked me as a football coach, what would you have taken?  Well, the death penalty is one year as I understand it.  I believe as a football coach I would rather have the death penalty.  I could come back faster, I believe, than this situation.  In any event, as an administrator, I'd say I would rather have this than the death penalty."

"When you think of all the victims involved, it's one of the worst tragedies anyone could ever have imaged," said Dooley