An unusual offseason brings about a few different things, but most importantly it gives people a chance to sit back and think. And ESPN's using its newfound free time to look back on some of college sports' most influential hires.

The worldwide leader is taking the time to rank the top 25 best hires over the last 25 years in football and men's basketball with two Gamecocks making the combined lists.

Steve Spurrier checks in as ESPN's 23rd-best college football hires over the last two and a half decades after taking "a program that had missed bowl games in three consecutive seasons and recorded Top 25 finishes just twice since entering the SEC in 1992," Adam Rittenberg wrote.

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"After going 9-5 in 2010 with a division title and a No. 22 finish, Spurrier sparked South Carolina to the best stretch in team history, as the Gamecocks went 33-6 with three top-10 finishes from 2011 to 2013," Rittenberg said. "Spurrier added one division title and two more SEC coach of the year awards to his Hall of Fame career with the Gamecocks, going 86-49 overall."

Spurrier took the Gamecocks to unprecedented heights, guiding them to a bowl game in nine of the 10 full seasons he coached in Columbia before leaving halfway through the 2015 season where the Gamecocks went 3-9.

In that time they played in one SEC Championship game and rattled off three straight 11 win seasons, the only three in school history.

Martin also checks in on the list at No. 23 as one of the best college basketball hires since 1995.

"Even if he hadn't defeated Duke in the 2017 round of 32 and taken his team to the Final Four as a No. 7 seed, Martin would be a strong candidate to make this list," ESPN's John Gasaway wrote. "He has elevated the South Carolina program just as he elevated the Kansas State program before arriving in Columbia."

Also see: PFF analysis of the Gamecocks' quarterbacks

Martin is most known for his historic run to the Final Four in 2017, but he's build a solid program at South Carolina with a winning record in five of the last six seasons and two 25-plus win seasons in 2016 and 17.

After taking a few years to get things stabilized, he's won double-digit SEC games four times in five years and, while he only has one tournament appearance, had his team in contention late in the season a few times in recent years.

ESPN's not even included women's basketball hires yet—it still might, although it's unclear—and if it did, there's no doubt Dawn Staley would be included as one of the best hires the last 25 years after taking the Gamecocks to two Final Fours and winning a national championship, all within the last five years.