I have to admit, I was a little concered about the hoops game on Saturday night, short turnaround for UGA, SCarolina having plenty of time to prepare and rest, coming off a big home win against Ole Miss, the way they battled back and nearly beat us in the first game after we had the big lead. How refreshing was it for the team to come out and take control and FINALLY keep control. Other than a minor scare early in the second half where Carolina got our lead down to around 10 pts, the game was really never in doubt. I know when Jeremy Price hit double figures just before the half, I was pretty darn excited. Remember, we have lost only ONE game this year where JP scores 10 or more points, that one was the UF loss at home in double OT. Of course the game featured our big two playing the way we all expected them to this year. Trey had 20 and 8 boards, Travis 15 and 7. JP with 14 and 6. Our defense was outstanding, holding SCarolina to only 48 points, 28% shooting-that is what we will need down the stretch. We now have two SECw opponents coming up this week, so far we are 4-0 against the west and if we can make that 6-0, the SEC tourney will not matter at all-we will be in the NCAA tourney. In fact, I think if we can beat LSU at home, that likely puts us in, the Bama and SEC tourney games then become about seeding. I will preview LSU tomorrow or Wed. As for the SEC tourney seedings, I will let you read Seth Emerson's information on that, I think he has done a fantastic job of breaking it down.
http://dawg-extra.blogspot.com/
Washaun Ealey has been reinstated to the football team and starting today can participate in all football operations. Per Coach Richt, he is doing things the "Georgia way" now and Richt is happy with his progress. Obviously Ealey is on a short leash so he better keep up the good work. I still think Crowell will beat him out but considering the inconsistent play of Caleb King-and I am just ASSuming he will make it back for the fall, it is good to have depth at the TB position. I personally think Crowell was promised the first carry of the football season during his recruitment but I still look for Ealey and King to get carries in game one.
The baseball team lost two of three to Baylor over the weekend-yes, Baylor is a ranked opponent but the loss yesterday, 19-12, well, it was much uglier than the score indicated in the rubber match of a series that I personally think we needed to win after the results at Stetson. You can read the details here below.
http://uga.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1194131
Finally, in non UGA news, a school in Atlanta with an underachieving mens basketball team has fired its coach-Hewitt-NO, not yet. Rod Barnes, formally of Ole Miss and now you can say the same with Ga State. He was fired yesterday after 4 years on the job. Now, you might ask me why I bring this up, well, here is something to think about if you are Ga. State. In a couple weeks, another underachieving coach in the ATL is likely to be fired, he will be paid a LARGE buyout, he has 3 daughters (or a daughter) that talked him into staying in the ATL last off season, yes, Paul Hewitt. He could work in the same town as he does now, he doesn't need a big contract, you think his name wouldn't excite the Ga. State faithful-hey, they already have one ex GT coach working there with Bill Curry the football coach. Now, Hewitt might never accept a position like Ga. State after coaching in the ACC but let's face it, he might not have any better offers and this one would allow him to stay in his current house and assuming he has daughters or at least a daughter that is still school age, I am sure she would LOVE to stay in her school and not move. If I am Ga. State, I would at least make him an offer because although I don't think he is an ACC caliber coach, he might could do well at GSU and I feel sure he could recruit some decent talent to that school with his connections. I have NO connections with the Ga State program but I think it is good for this state to have winning basketball programs and I personally would love for Ga State to surpass GT in both football and basketball-to become the school of choice in the Atlanta market (well, UGA is still the school of choice in this state but let's just say I want Ga State to become better than GT). Just something I thought about when I heard Barnes was out, and knowing Hewitt is likely out soon as well. What do you all think-crazy idea or a real possibility???
Monday, February 28, 2011
Friday, February 25, 2011
As has been the case all year it seems
Our basketball team simply can't play at a consistently high level for an entire game. This explains how they can look so darn good for stretches of time but then so bad at times. It explains how we can build big leads but just as easily blow big leads. Seth Emerson has a good breakdown of our big leads and then losses this year-when you look at this, you simply shake your head because you realize we CAN play with just about anybody in the country. We are good enough to build leads but bad enough to never be able to take that next step, putting a team away and coasting to a win. We did that a few times this year, the Ole Miss and Miss State games immediately come to mind, but typically our wins have been a LOT closer than they ever should have been if our play was more consistent.
http://dawg-extra.blogspot.com/
I mentioned before just how important Chandler Parsons is for the Gators and I think we all witnessed it during the second half last night. Between he and Macklin, they got 15 rebounds-6 offensive and those rebounds, along with Parsons and Boynton taking and making wide open 3's, it was too much for us to overcome. After shooting 60% in the first half, we had trouble scoring early in the second half and let UF right back in the game and allowed them to grab control of a game that we clearly had taken control of early. I knew they would pressure us and sure enough they did, and we had a lot of turnovers in the second half. It was like Billy D went into the locker room and told the Gators, you guys are getting outhustled on your home floor and this has got to stop-our guys couldn't match their intensity in the second half. To me there is little doubt that Parsons is the glue that holds that team together, his effort/hustle in the early portion of the second half set the tone, then he had a key offensive rebound and put back when we had it down to 4, that pretty much sealed the deal. I was very optimistic of our chances when I thought he wouldn't play but when I read he was coming off the bench, I lost some confidence-he has ALWAYS killed us and did so again last night. For us, Travis and Trey both had solid games but our starting guards combined for 12 pts, meanwhile the UF guards scored 33. There is the difference in the game right there. Now it is time to put that one behind us QUICKLY as we have a MUST win game coming up tomorrow. SCarolina is not a bad team and we can not afford to take them lightly. We need to jump them early and then unlike at Columbia, put them away. But, they played Tuesday night and won a big game, they will ready for us. The Ole Miss win was their first after losing 5 consecutive games. Remember, this SCarolina team started SEC play 3-1 and now sit at 5-8 and so you do the math, since that good start, they are 2-7. That being said, they have beat Vandy and won at UF, both teams that swept us. Our guys better shake that loss off quickly and get ready to play a tough rested opponent that has NOTHING to lose. We have everything to lose. As was the case the first time, there are 3 guys on the SCarolina roster we have to contain-SR Sam Muldrow, JR Nevada transfer Malik Cooke and FR point guard Bruce Ellington-had a horrible game against us the first time but if he is on, he can hurt you shooting the 3. One thing that has been in our favor all year in hoops, lack of what is considered a "bad" loss by selection committee standards. These next two games, Saturday against SCarolina and Wed against LSU are MUST win games or we likely HAVE to win at Bama or win a couple SEC tourney games. Let's hope the hoopsters come ready to play Sat night, I am sure we will have a good crowd, it is about time for the team to get that home court swagger back.
Last note, baseball team hosts Baylor for a three game series this weekend. A sweep would be great, 2 out of 3 would be ok, less than that would NOT be good. Let's hope for at least 2 of 3 and maybe the team can get some confidence going as Perno has set up a very challenging schedule for this team that fights hard to reclaim their place as an elite in college baseball. Hope everyone has a great weekend.
http://dawg-extra.blogspot.com/
I mentioned before just how important Chandler Parsons is for the Gators and I think we all witnessed it during the second half last night. Between he and Macklin, they got 15 rebounds-6 offensive and those rebounds, along with Parsons and Boynton taking and making wide open 3's, it was too much for us to overcome. After shooting 60% in the first half, we had trouble scoring early in the second half and let UF right back in the game and allowed them to grab control of a game that we clearly had taken control of early. I knew they would pressure us and sure enough they did, and we had a lot of turnovers in the second half. It was like Billy D went into the locker room and told the Gators, you guys are getting outhustled on your home floor and this has got to stop-our guys couldn't match their intensity in the second half. To me there is little doubt that Parsons is the glue that holds that team together, his effort/hustle in the early portion of the second half set the tone, then he had a key offensive rebound and put back when we had it down to 4, that pretty much sealed the deal. I was very optimistic of our chances when I thought he wouldn't play but when I read he was coming off the bench, I lost some confidence-he has ALWAYS killed us and did so again last night. For us, Travis and Trey both had solid games but our starting guards combined for 12 pts, meanwhile the UF guards scored 33. There is the difference in the game right there. Now it is time to put that one behind us QUICKLY as we have a MUST win game coming up tomorrow. SCarolina is not a bad team and we can not afford to take them lightly. We need to jump them early and then unlike at Columbia, put them away. But, they played Tuesday night and won a big game, they will ready for us. The Ole Miss win was their first after losing 5 consecutive games. Remember, this SCarolina team started SEC play 3-1 and now sit at 5-8 and so you do the math, since that good start, they are 2-7. That being said, they have beat Vandy and won at UF, both teams that swept us. Our guys better shake that loss off quickly and get ready to play a tough rested opponent that has NOTHING to lose. We have everything to lose. As was the case the first time, there are 3 guys on the SCarolina roster we have to contain-SR Sam Muldrow, JR Nevada transfer Malik Cooke and FR point guard Bruce Ellington-had a horrible game against us the first time but if he is on, he can hurt you shooting the 3. One thing that has been in our favor all year in hoops, lack of what is considered a "bad" loss by selection committee standards. These next two games, Saturday against SCarolina and Wed against LSU are MUST win games or we likely HAVE to win at Bama or win a couple SEC tourney games. Let's hope the hoopsters come ready to play Sat night, I am sure we will have a good crowd, it is about time for the team to get that home court swagger back.
Last note, baseball team hosts Baylor for a three game series this weekend. A sweep would be great, 2 out of 3 would be ok, less than that would NOT be good. Let's hope for at least 2 of 3 and maybe the team can get some confidence going as Perno has set up a very challenging schedule for this team that fights hard to reclaim their place as an elite in college baseball. Hope everyone has a great weekend.
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Big game tonight, baseball team gets first win, 2012 recruiting class
First of all, I watched a good portion of the Alabama-Auburn basketball game last night, WOW, talk about UGLY basketball. Also, talk about home cooking with some calls-why is it UGA can't get some of this home cooking when we play at home?? Auburn ended up having 4 starters foul out of the game, yet Bama had to hit a shot a the horn to get the W in what could have potentially knocked them out of the NCAA tourney. They trailed all game but to their credit-and help of the zebras, found a way to win. Of course tonight we play the Gators and a win there would be huge obviously for our NCAA hopes and also divisional standings. Kentucky, as I predicted yesterday, LOST again on the road, this time at Arkansas in OT. So now they are tied with Tenn at 7-6 in conference play. A win tonight could tie us with Vandy at 8-5, which would put us two games behind UF and technically still in 3rd since Vandy swept us this year. It appears likely at this point UF plans to play this game without SR leader Chandler Parsons starting-he likely will get some minutes but we shall see how that all pans out. Now, this should give UGA an advantage, especially considering how well Parson played against us last time and how well he has played against us in his career. But, sometimes when a guy goes out, other guys pick up the slack and the "team" concept is very strong. UF is clearly in the tournament regardless of the outcome of this game, but they are playing tonight to lock up at least a tie in the east, they still have a shot at the outright SEC title, also they are currently projected as a 3 seed, certainly if they can win several games down the stretch they figure to hold that high seeding in the NCAA tourney. That being said, this game is big for us and we have played well on the road this season. We can certainly play with UF, that is not in doubt. But, we will have to do a better job handling Vernon Macklin-he really controlled the boards in game 1. Also, you always have to be very aware of Boynton and Walker-if those guys are hitting their shots, it will be a tough task to win this game. We have to play very aggressive defense, we MUST grab rebounds on our defensive end, and must limit the turnovers. UF is starting a FR in place of Parsons, Casey Prather. He is a very athletic guy and UF likes to full court press with him in the lineup-look for them to try to press us and force some turnovers and easy baskets. Also, they will be very aware of Trey Thompkins-he always plays well against UF, last game he has 20 pts and 13 boards, so as a lot of our opponents have done this year, look for them to double him early and often. This of course will leave someone open, likely Price and he needs to play another good game as he did in Knoxville. We need to come out strong again tonight, in most of our road games this year, that has been a big part of us winning or being competitive in these games-fast starts, taking the crowd out of the game, avoiding turnovers-playing smart and aggressive defense and rebouding. UF has a couple big guys in Macklin and Tyus, we have to keep them from getting offensive rebounds and easy put backs. This is a game that while I do think we can win, I don't have an extremely high confidence level either-course we had not won in Knoxville in 10 years, it has been about 9-10 years since we last won in Gainesville. This would be a great time to end that losing streak, let's hope our guys have what it takes to beat the Gators.
The baseball team got their first win yesterday over Furman, 6-4 at Foley Field. You can read about it here with this article from the Athens paper. Up next is a weekend series against Baylor.
http://dogbytesonline.com/bulldogs-end-early-jitters-42534/
Finally today, I want to take a look at the 2012 recruiting numbers. We just finished up the Dream Team class of 2011, we ended up with 26 signees. We have 14 seniors this upcoming year but you have to think we will end up closer to 18 or more. Reason being, attrition and kids possibly leaving early for the pros. Off the top of my head, I would say the following I could see leaving the program early for various reasons-pros, lack of PT etc.
Orson Charles, Jeremy Longo, Ty Frix, Carlton Thomas, Washaun Ealey and Chase Vasser.
The reason I selected these guys, I think Charles goes pro. Longo has never really seen the field and is a rising JR and from out of state-as is Thomas. Ealey is also a rising JR and we all know his issues. Vasser, plays some on special teams but I could see him leaving and going somewhere smaller to get some PT. Also, Jarvis Jones, he is another to watch with him being a redshirt Soph-he already had the neck injury scare, if he has a great season, you have to think he could strongly consider leaving and getting paid. I also think Austin Long could be a candidate for a medical situation depending on how he does this spring/fall after his injury situation. AJ Harmon could be another with his grade issues and still struggling to get significant playing time. As you can see, there are a lot of players that I could see leaving the program after the 2011 season. So, even though we only have 14 slots available based on seniors, I would be surprised if we didn't end up with a class closer to 20 than 15. A lot has been made about how few kids we have offered to compared to our rivals but I personally like it that way because we only offer kids we are prepared to accept-that should mean something to the HS coaches, to the players themselves to be honest. If you get offered by Bama but they have offered 5 other guys at your position, what if 2 of those guys commit, guess what, your offer is no longer good. We will lose some in state players this year, no doubt about that but we will get plenty of talented players in the class of 2012 so I am not the least bit concerned.
The baseball team got their first win yesterday over Furman, 6-4 at Foley Field. You can read about it here with this article from the Athens paper. Up next is a weekend series against Baylor.
http://dogbytesonline.com/bulldogs-end-early-jitters-42534/
Finally today, I want to take a look at the 2012 recruiting numbers. We just finished up the Dream Team class of 2011, we ended up with 26 signees. We have 14 seniors this upcoming year but you have to think we will end up closer to 18 or more. Reason being, attrition and kids possibly leaving early for the pros. Off the top of my head, I would say the following I could see leaving the program early for various reasons-pros, lack of PT etc.
Orson Charles, Jeremy Longo, Ty Frix, Carlton Thomas, Washaun Ealey and Chase Vasser.
The reason I selected these guys, I think Charles goes pro. Longo has never really seen the field and is a rising JR and from out of state-as is Thomas. Ealey is also a rising JR and we all know his issues. Vasser, plays some on special teams but I could see him leaving and going somewhere smaller to get some PT. Also, Jarvis Jones, he is another to watch with him being a redshirt Soph-he already had the neck injury scare, if he has a great season, you have to think he could strongly consider leaving and getting paid. I also think Austin Long could be a candidate for a medical situation depending on how he does this spring/fall after his injury situation. AJ Harmon could be another with his grade issues and still struggling to get significant playing time. As you can see, there are a lot of players that I could see leaving the program after the 2011 season. So, even though we only have 14 slots available based on seniors, I would be surprised if we didn't end up with a class closer to 20 than 15. A lot has been made about how few kids we have offered to compared to our rivals but I personally like it that way because we only offer kids we are prepared to accept-that should mean something to the HS coaches, to the players themselves to be honest. If you get offered by Bama but they have offered 5 other guys at your position, what if 2 of those guys commit, guess what, your offer is no longer good. We will lose some in state players this year, no doubt about that but we will get plenty of talented players in the class of 2012 so I am not the least bit concerned.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Wow, SECe is a jumbled mess isn't it
With Tennessee going into to Nashville and beating Vandy, now the east is really a jumbled mess. If UGA can somehow beat UF in Gainesville, then UK wins at Arkansas, really is interesting battle for 2-5 seeds in our division. Of course in the west, Bama has essentially wrapped that side up with a 4 game lead, 4 games to play. The east, with Vandy losing last night, UF has basically won the division. They are up by at least 3 on everyone now. Let's take a closer look at the east standings and schedules remaining and then make an educated guess on how the division will shake out.
UF 21-5 10-2 schedule remaining UGA, @ Kentucky, Bama, @Vandy
Vandy 20-7 8-5 @LSU, @Kentucky, UF
Kentucky 19-7 7-5 @Arkansas, UF, Vandy, @Tenn
UGA 18-8 7-5 @UF, SCarolina, LSU, @Bama
Tenn 17-11 7-6 Miss State, @SCarolina, UK
SCarolina 14-12 5-8 @UGA, UT, @Miss State
So, three of the 6 teams played games last night, SCarolina got a home win against Ole Miss-they now have extra time to rest and prepare for us on Saturday, while we have the quick turnaround of Thursday-Saturday. If I were to predict how the division would shake out, it would go something like this-
UF 11-5 lose to UGA(I really think we can beat them especially without Parsons), UK, Vandy, beat Bama
Vandy 10-6 beat LSU, UF, lose to UK
UGA 10-6 Beat UF, SCarolina, LSU, lose at Bama-could flip Bama/UF as well.
Kentucky 9-7 Beat UF, Vandy, lose Ark and UT
Tenn 9-7 Beat Miss State, UK, lose to SCarolina
SCarolina 6-10 lose to UGA, Miss State, beat UT
Of course these are just my predictions but looking at it realisticially, we have played well on the road all year and so no reason for me to believe we couldn't beat either UF or Bama. The home games SHOULD be wins but I would not be surprised if we drop one of those. Worst case for us to me is 9-7 in SEC play. Tenn has the best remaing schedule to get to 10-6 but they have lost several at home as well. UK doesn't win on the road but doesn't lose at home so I think my 2-2 prediction for them is very accurate. Vandy is a solid team, I can't see them losing another home game but after blowing the big lead last night, who knows-seems we managed to blow a 14pt lead to Vandy, so guess they got a taste of that last night at home. They lost an even bigger lead when they played UT in Knoxville earlier in the year, they have to feel snakebit against the Vols. Needless to say, should make for a very interesting week and a half to close out the regular season. We just need to take care of our home court and maybe steal another road win-but winning these two home games against teams with HORRIBLE RPI's is a must.
I read this article earlier today and thought it worth sharing, about one of our 2011 recruits that has already enrolled in school. Sounds like a great kid, let's hope he can use this spring to help get ready for the 2011 season-we will need some guys to step up to help replace AJ Green, this kid certainly has a lot of potential-not only on the field but also off the field.
http://dogbytesonline.com/smith-bulldogs-wr-conley-a-man-of-many-talents-42511/
Baseball team opens the home schedule today with a 5pm game against Furman. I remember writing on this blog last week, Stetson is NOT an easy opponent-they regularly participate in the NCAA tourney and they swept us. SO, everyone is now thinking the baseball team is going to repeat last years dismal season. Well, sure it is possible but I say, WAIT a few more games before jumping ship. Baseball is a long season and Perno has brought in some talented players, and we return some solid players as well. Hopefully as the season progresses, this team will turn things in the right direction.
One last note, per the athletic association, it appears our sorry 6-7 season has not really hit the pocketbook of UGA fans. Donations are very much the same as last year, pretty close to the normal and probably will be completely normal-despite our record and the hard economic times the country still finds itself in. You can check out this article for more details. I have long ago given up my season tickets for football-I held season tickets from 1991-the year I graduated, until 2002-the year the lid was lifted off the program with first SEC title since 1982. After that season, they implemented the pay per seat rule, along with paying for the tickets themselves. My parents, thanks Mom and Dad, had been buying my season tickets as a yearly gift since I graduated but at that point, they said we can't afford to do that which I completely understood. As it stands now, my kids are involved in fall sports so I couldn't go even if I had tickets-sorry but as much as I love watching UGA football, I LOVE watching my kids MUCH more. So now I just try my best to watch the games on TV or listen on the radio. If I miss the broadcast, I will go back and watch the replay-thanks to my DVR. All this being said, I fully respect those that do fork out the money to attend the games and continue to do so even during the tough times-both on the field here recently and off the field-economy.
http://dogbytesonline.com/officials-satisfied-by-latest-donations-42507/
Oh, one more note, the Lady Dogs softball team has earned the #1 ranking in nation for the first time in the history of the program. Great job!
http://dogbytesonline.com/dogs-reach-no-1-for-first-time-in-program-history-42508/
UF 21-5 10-2 schedule remaining UGA, @ Kentucky, Bama, @Vandy
Vandy 20-7 8-5 @LSU, @Kentucky, UF
Kentucky 19-7 7-5 @Arkansas, UF, Vandy, @Tenn
UGA 18-8 7-5 @UF, SCarolina, LSU, @Bama
Tenn 17-11 7-6 Miss State, @SCarolina, UK
SCarolina 14-12 5-8 @UGA, UT, @Miss State
So, three of the 6 teams played games last night, SCarolina got a home win against Ole Miss-they now have extra time to rest and prepare for us on Saturday, while we have the quick turnaround of Thursday-Saturday. If I were to predict how the division would shake out, it would go something like this-
UF 11-5 lose to UGA(I really think we can beat them especially without Parsons), UK, Vandy, beat Bama
Vandy 10-6 beat LSU, UF, lose to UK
UGA 10-6 Beat UF, SCarolina, LSU, lose at Bama-could flip Bama/UF as well.
Kentucky 9-7 Beat UF, Vandy, lose Ark and UT
Tenn 9-7 Beat Miss State, UK, lose to SCarolina
SCarolina 6-10 lose to UGA, Miss State, beat UT
Of course these are just my predictions but looking at it realisticially, we have played well on the road all year and so no reason for me to believe we couldn't beat either UF or Bama. The home games SHOULD be wins but I would not be surprised if we drop one of those. Worst case for us to me is 9-7 in SEC play. Tenn has the best remaing schedule to get to 10-6 but they have lost several at home as well. UK doesn't win on the road but doesn't lose at home so I think my 2-2 prediction for them is very accurate. Vandy is a solid team, I can't see them losing another home game but after blowing the big lead last night, who knows-seems we managed to blow a 14pt lead to Vandy, so guess they got a taste of that last night at home. They lost an even bigger lead when they played UT in Knoxville earlier in the year, they have to feel snakebit against the Vols. Needless to say, should make for a very interesting week and a half to close out the regular season. We just need to take care of our home court and maybe steal another road win-but winning these two home games against teams with HORRIBLE RPI's is a must.
I read this article earlier today and thought it worth sharing, about one of our 2011 recruits that has already enrolled in school. Sounds like a great kid, let's hope he can use this spring to help get ready for the 2011 season-we will need some guys to step up to help replace AJ Green, this kid certainly has a lot of potential-not only on the field but also off the field.
http://dogbytesonline.com/smith-bulldogs-wr-conley-a-man-of-many-talents-42511/
Baseball team opens the home schedule today with a 5pm game against Furman. I remember writing on this blog last week, Stetson is NOT an easy opponent-they regularly participate in the NCAA tourney and they swept us. SO, everyone is now thinking the baseball team is going to repeat last years dismal season. Well, sure it is possible but I say, WAIT a few more games before jumping ship. Baseball is a long season and Perno has brought in some talented players, and we return some solid players as well. Hopefully as the season progresses, this team will turn things in the right direction.
One last note, per the athletic association, it appears our sorry 6-7 season has not really hit the pocketbook of UGA fans. Donations are very much the same as last year, pretty close to the normal and probably will be completely normal-despite our record and the hard economic times the country still finds itself in. You can check out this article for more details. I have long ago given up my season tickets for football-I held season tickets from 1991-the year I graduated, until 2002-the year the lid was lifted off the program with first SEC title since 1982. After that season, they implemented the pay per seat rule, along with paying for the tickets themselves. My parents, thanks Mom and Dad, had been buying my season tickets as a yearly gift since I graduated but at that point, they said we can't afford to do that which I completely understood. As it stands now, my kids are involved in fall sports so I couldn't go even if I had tickets-sorry but as much as I love watching UGA football, I LOVE watching my kids MUCH more. So now I just try my best to watch the games on TV or listen on the radio. If I miss the broadcast, I will go back and watch the replay-thanks to my DVR. All this being said, I fully respect those that do fork out the money to attend the games and continue to do so even during the tough times-both on the field here recently and off the field-economy.
http://dogbytesonline.com/officials-satisfied-by-latest-donations-42507/
Oh, one more note, the Lady Dogs softball team has earned the #1 ranking in nation for the first time in the history of the program. Great job!
http://dogbytesonline.com/dogs-reach-no-1-for-first-time-in-program-history-42508/
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Been away for a little bit, what did I miss???
Sorry, I enjoyed my President's day long weekend without updating the blog. Let me start by saying, GREAT win by Fox and company Saturday in Knoxville. As I mentioned last week, seems this team has really turned the corner when it comes to winning road basketball games. We now have 7 road wins this year after having ZERO last year. In fact, you could certainly argue that we are now a better road team than home team. Looking at this calendar year, we are now 3-4 at home in 2011 and 4-2 on the road. Amazing how that happens in a year. Course when it comes to the NCAA tourney which the UT game helped our chances in a BIG way, you play on the road-neutral you could say but certainly not at home. Next up for us is a Thursday night game in Gainesville against the first place Gators. They currently have a 2 game lead on second place Vandy, a 3 game lead on us. The guy that KILLED us in the second OT, Chandler Parsons, is listed as questionable for the game on Thursday. UF is in a pretty cozy position within the division and as far as the NCAA tourney goes. They are 21-5 and 10-2 in conference. They also have what I would consider a VERY difficult schedule down the stretch-home vs. us on Thursday, at Kentucky on Saturday, home vs. Bama next Tuesday, and close out at Vandy on March 5th. So, do they rest Parsons another game (he sat our on Sunday as UF won at LSU) or do they play him against us hoping to get the win at home knowing that winning in Lexington Saturday will be very tough? UF is good enough to beat us without Chandler Parsons BUT certainly taking a SR leader away from that team, a guy that scored 18 points and 12 rebounds against us in the first game, I would love it if he didn't play. If we could pull off the win on Thursday, wow, talk about a team that would be on a good roll with two games, SCarolina and LSU coming up that we should be able to win-even playing at home!! Regardless, the win at UT did a couple things, it improved our NCAA resume for sure, it gave us 7 conference wins and again, we have two very winnable games left out of 4-I would argue we have 4 very winnable games but certainly 2 that we should NOT lose. It also really hurt UT in that it puts them behind us in the division, they are at 16-11 and still have at Vandy, Miss State, at SCarolina and home vs UK. You have to figure they will lose at least one more game so the win really helps us as we try to get the 3 or at worst 4 seed in the SECe for the tourney. If the NCAA somehow only selects 4 teams from the SECe, our win against UT certainly helps us in that discussion. Back to the game, Jeremy Price came up HUGE with 20 pts, Travis chipped in 15, Ware with 12 and Trey will 11. Now, Trey continues to struggle at times without question but you have to think he drawing doubles every time he touches it really does help out Jeremy Price-in fact Dean Legge did a piece last week about Price being the key to UGA's success. I am not going to say Price is truly the key but he certainly is a big factor IF teams continue to double Trey-Jeremy is going to have opportunities to get open shots and he has to knock them down. But, another key will be our ball movement because if a team is doubling Trey, SOMEONE is wide open and it is up to the players on the court to find that open guy-then that guy has to make his shots. It was crucial that Dustin Ware hit 4 free throws down the stretch after missing a couple as well. Another bright spot, as has been the case a lot lately, we built a big lead only to let the opponent come back. UT actually took the lead on us in the second half but we battled back and took over again and then held on. You have to be encouraged that our last 3 trips we have won TIGHT games on the road-at Arkansas, South Carolina and UT.
I found an interesting site that contains projected brackets from many sources-I think this is maybe the best way to view where we stand at the moment. The encouraging thing is, as of now EVERYONE has us in. We range from an 8-12 seed but everyone projects us in. Course the bottom line is for us to be in on Sunday, March 13th but you would rather be in right now than be out.
http://bracketproject.50webs.com/matrix.htm
Of course yesterday the story broke about Aaron Murray, with the all kinds of rumors-broke his foot, high ankle sprain, broke his ankle etc. Turns out, just an ankle sprain-see link below.
http://blogs.ajc.com/uga-sports-blog/2011/02/21/murray-injury-will-be-examined-info-expected-later-today/?cxntfid=blogs_uga_sports_blog
Seems pretty minor in the grand scheme of things, he should be ready for spring practice so we can all take a deep breath now. Even if he was out for spring, not a horrible thing as LeMay and Mason could have waged a serious battle for number two. Of course they can still do that now even with Murray being there, we need to make a decision on LeMay and for me, I think unless Murray is gone for several games, Mason should be the backup. Now, certainly it is a luxury to have a quality backup QB in place but I think we all wished DJ Shockley would have had two years to play instead of just one after David Greene left-and DJ did redshirt of course. That would have pushed Stafford to maybe never come to Athens of course or he would have pushed him to redshirt his first year perhaps-bottom line, 2006 would have likely been a much better season with SR DJ Shockley playing instead of FR Matt Stafford. My point being, LeMay by all accounts is a very talented QB, to me every effort should be made to redshirt him, let him back up Murray for two years and then he takes over for two years. Back to Murray, seems he got hurt playing soccer. Obviously you would rather him not be out playing a contact sport of any kind where injury can occur but he is a college kid and you can't restrict him from having fun. I know a lot of our plays play intramural basketball, you can hurt an ankle very easily.
It is now known the coaches salaries for our new hires, seems like we are saving about 40K from the two coaches these guys replace but bottom line, our coaches are well compensated I think. We don't seem to be mid to low when it comes coaches salaries as we were back a few years ago. Here is the Tim Tucker article about what our new guys are getting paid. I really think we made two good hires with Friend and Olivadotti, let's hope these guys can come in and do great with their two very important positions. I think OL and LB will be two HUGE areas where improvement can make us a much better team in 2011.
http://blogs.ajc.com/uga-sports-blog/2011/02/21/what-ugas-new-football-coaches-will-be-paid/?cxntfid=blogs_uga_sports_blog
Another interesting thing to report, seems the top RB's for the class of 2012 are already committing-Bama has already received two verbals as has UF. Bama has verbals from two top Ga RB's, UF from one of the top in Ga and also Matt Jones, the top back in Florida who for a long time was rumored to be a strong UGA lean. What this tells me is this-running backs in the class of 2011 are plenty scared of one thing-getting any carries from Isiah Crowell. That being said, UGA is thought to be the leader for Keith Marshall, a top 2012 RB from NC. Below is his profile. From what I have gathered, Marshall is a strong UGA lean and is likely to be the top if not top 2-3 RB's in the nation for the class of 2012. SO, if we can land Marshall, we will have perhaps the top RB duo in the nation to go along with Aaron Murray as a JR. We just need to get a big time WR to go along with Marshall in the class of 2012.
http://rivals.yahoo.com/uga/football/recruiting/player-Keith-Marshall-104798
This kid has a 4.1 GPA, he will enroll early from what I have heard so I would imagine he will make a decision pretty soon as well. From what I have gathered, UGA and UNC might be the the top two for him.
A couple of negatives to close, UGA baseball was swept at Stetson over the weekend. Not a good start as Coach Perno tries to bring the winning ways back to the diamond but it is a long season so not ready to panic yet. First home games is Wed at 5pm against Furman. The Lady Dogs lost in hoops yesterday to #4 Tennessee, which clinched the regular season title for the Lady Vols. They have not lost in conference this year and average margin of victory has been just over 24pts-they simply have dominated the league. Still, the Lady Dogs have 20 wins and likely will finish second or at worst third in the league-make the NCAA tourney yet again. If anything, Coach Landers and his program is consistent. Only problem is, UT is just better and then you have UCONN who basically might lose at most 1-2 games a season. It is a tough climb to get to the top when it seems UCONN and UT get the top players from all over the nation every single year.
I found an interesting site that contains projected brackets from many sources-I think this is maybe the best way to view where we stand at the moment. The encouraging thing is, as of now EVERYONE has us in. We range from an 8-12 seed but everyone projects us in. Course the bottom line is for us to be in on Sunday, March 13th but you would rather be in right now than be out.
http://bracketproject.50webs.com/matrix.htm
Of course yesterday the story broke about Aaron Murray, with the all kinds of rumors-broke his foot, high ankle sprain, broke his ankle etc. Turns out, just an ankle sprain-see link below.
http://blogs.ajc.com/uga-sports-blog/2011/02/21/murray-injury-will-be-examined-info-expected-later-today/?cxntfid=blogs_uga_sports_blog
Seems pretty minor in the grand scheme of things, he should be ready for spring practice so we can all take a deep breath now. Even if he was out for spring, not a horrible thing as LeMay and Mason could have waged a serious battle for number two. Of course they can still do that now even with Murray being there, we need to make a decision on LeMay and for me, I think unless Murray is gone for several games, Mason should be the backup. Now, certainly it is a luxury to have a quality backup QB in place but I think we all wished DJ Shockley would have had two years to play instead of just one after David Greene left-and DJ did redshirt of course. That would have pushed Stafford to maybe never come to Athens of course or he would have pushed him to redshirt his first year perhaps-bottom line, 2006 would have likely been a much better season with SR DJ Shockley playing instead of FR Matt Stafford. My point being, LeMay by all accounts is a very talented QB, to me every effort should be made to redshirt him, let him back up Murray for two years and then he takes over for two years. Back to Murray, seems he got hurt playing soccer. Obviously you would rather him not be out playing a contact sport of any kind where injury can occur but he is a college kid and you can't restrict him from having fun. I know a lot of our plays play intramural basketball, you can hurt an ankle very easily.
It is now known the coaches salaries for our new hires, seems like we are saving about 40K from the two coaches these guys replace but bottom line, our coaches are well compensated I think. We don't seem to be mid to low when it comes coaches salaries as we were back a few years ago. Here is the Tim Tucker article about what our new guys are getting paid. I really think we made two good hires with Friend and Olivadotti, let's hope these guys can come in and do great with their two very important positions. I think OL and LB will be two HUGE areas where improvement can make us a much better team in 2011.
http://blogs.ajc.com/uga-sports-blog/2011/02/21/what-ugas-new-football-coaches-will-be-paid/?cxntfid=blogs_uga_sports_blog
Another interesting thing to report, seems the top RB's for the class of 2012 are already committing-Bama has already received two verbals as has UF. Bama has verbals from two top Ga RB's, UF from one of the top in Ga and also Matt Jones, the top back in Florida who for a long time was rumored to be a strong UGA lean. What this tells me is this-running backs in the class of 2011 are plenty scared of one thing-getting any carries from Isiah Crowell. That being said, UGA is thought to be the leader for Keith Marshall, a top 2012 RB from NC. Below is his profile. From what I have gathered, Marshall is a strong UGA lean and is likely to be the top if not top 2-3 RB's in the nation for the class of 2012. SO, if we can land Marshall, we will have perhaps the top RB duo in the nation to go along with Aaron Murray as a JR. We just need to get a big time WR to go along with Marshall in the class of 2012.
http://rivals.yahoo.com/uga/football/recruiting/player-Keith-Marshall-104798
This kid has a 4.1 GPA, he will enroll early from what I have heard so I would imagine he will make a decision pretty soon as well. From what I have gathered, UGA and UNC might be the the top two for him.
A couple of negatives to close, UGA baseball was swept at Stetson over the weekend. Not a good start as Coach Perno tries to bring the winning ways back to the diamond but it is a long season so not ready to panic yet. First home games is Wed at 5pm against Furman. The Lady Dogs lost in hoops yesterday to #4 Tennessee, which clinched the regular season title for the Lady Vols. They have not lost in conference this year and average margin of victory has been just over 24pts-they simply have dominated the league. Still, the Lady Dogs have 20 wins and likely will finish second or at worst third in the league-make the NCAA tourney yet again. If anything, Coach Landers and his program is consistent. Only problem is, UT is just better and then you have UCONN who basically might lose at most 1-2 games a season. It is a tough climb to get to the top when it seems UCONN and UT get the top players from all over the nation every single year.
Friday, February 18, 2011
News and notes
Today it is official, Kirk Olivadotti is the new inside LB coach at UGA. Here is a link to read a few quotes about the hiring.
http://dogbytesonline.com/georgia-makes-olivadotti-hiring-official-42406/
Course this looks to be a great hire, it does leave you to wonder why a guy that spent 11 years in the NFL would leave to take a lateral looking position. As far as I know, Olivadotti has no ties to Georgia, I know he was a HS athlete in Florida as his Dad worked for the Dolphins. He went to college at Purdue. Former UGA player and current Redskin Phillip Daniels said this was a great hire-this guy has worked with a lot of good defensive minds, of course his Dad was a longtime NFL defensive coach/coordinator. LB is a key position for us this upcoming year, we have talent there but not a lot of experience. Hopefully this guy can coach those guys up because they are going to have the chance to make a LOT of plays this fall.
Baseball team opens up today at Stetson, as I mentioned before, Stetson is no light weight team. They annually make the NCAA tourney and have a solid program-most programs in Florida are good because there are so many good baseball players in that state and the surrounding states, the weather allows them to play almost year around. Below I have posted a series of articles from the Athens paper so you can check them out to catch up on what is going on with the baseball team. They have some good players returning and signed a good looking class that is coming in, hopefully they will revert back to CWS form and not have another dreadful season like last year.
http://dogbytesonline.com/perno-adds-to-group-of-new-players-38826/
http://dogbytesonline.com/bulldog-trio-among-top-2011-mlb-draft-prospects-40866/
http://dogbytesonline.com/bulldogs-over-last-years-nightmare-season-as-preseason-practice-begins-41701/
http://dogbytesonline.com/pitchers-put-2010-behind-them-42400/
Great job by Coach Andy Landers and his Lady Dogs, beating 19th ranked Kentucky Wildcats 69-51, improving to 20-6, and 10-3 in SEC play. Landers now has 26 twenty wins seasons in his 32 year career in Athens, the team is now sitting alone in second place in the SEC behind only Tennessee, who the Lady Dogs will play Monday in Knoxville, UT is 24-2 and 12-0 in the SEC.
Speaking of Knoxville, that is where the mens team will be tomorrow. Of course the last time the two teams met, UT got a last second put back from Brian Williams to steal the win in Athens. That play was reviewed to see if he beat the buzzer which of course gave everyone many chances to view the obvious no call of Briam Williams over the back of Chris Barnes. UT has not been playing well lately although they did win their last time out against SCarolina at home. If you look at who they have beat in conference play, the win against us was probably their best win. Other wins, home against Vandy by 3, home vs. LSU, @Miss, @AU, and then home vs. SCarolina. They have lost to Arkansas on the road, Florida at home, Bama at home, at Kentuck and at Florida. All together, they have lost 5 games at home this year, so much like us, they have not been stellar at home. Course a big key to stopping UT is slowing down Scotty Hopson, their best scorer and then also Brian Williams who got the huge put back last time. Another key for them will be the play of Tobias Harris. I can't recall the last time we won in Knoxville so let's just say I will be surprised if we win this game but certainly a win Saturday or next Thursday in Gainesville would do wonders for our team. Let's hope we can keep it close and then steal one back from the ugly orange tomorrow. Game is on CBS at 1pm.
http://dogbytesonline.com/georgia-makes-olivadotti-hiring-official-42406/
Course this looks to be a great hire, it does leave you to wonder why a guy that spent 11 years in the NFL would leave to take a lateral looking position. As far as I know, Olivadotti has no ties to Georgia, I know he was a HS athlete in Florida as his Dad worked for the Dolphins. He went to college at Purdue. Former UGA player and current Redskin Phillip Daniels said this was a great hire-this guy has worked with a lot of good defensive minds, of course his Dad was a longtime NFL defensive coach/coordinator. LB is a key position for us this upcoming year, we have talent there but not a lot of experience. Hopefully this guy can coach those guys up because they are going to have the chance to make a LOT of plays this fall.
Baseball team opens up today at Stetson, as I mentioned before, Stetson is no light weight team. They annually make the NCAA tourney and have a solid program-most programs in Florida are good because there are so many good baseball players in that state and the surrounding states, the weather allows them to play almost year around. Below I have posted a series of articles from the Athens paper so you can check them out to catch up on what is going on with the baseball team. They have some good players returning and signed a good looking class that is coming in, hopefully they will revert back to CWS form and not have another dreadful season like last year.
http://dogbytesonline.com/perno-adds-to-group-of-new-players-38826/
http://dogbytesonline.com/bulldog-trio-among-top-2011-mlb-draft-prospects-40866/
http://dogbytesonline.com/bulldogs-over-last-years-nightmare-season-as-preseason-practice-begins-41701/
http://dogbytesonline.com/pitchers-put-2010-behind-them-42400/
Great job by Coach Andy Landers and his Lady Dogs, beating 19th ranked Kentucky Wildcats 69-51, improving to 20-6, and 10-3 in SEC play. Landers now has 26 twenty wins seasons in his 32 year career in Athens, the team is now sitting alone in second place in the SEC behind only Tennessee, who the Lady Dogs will play Monday in Knoxville, UT is 24-2 and 12-0 in the SEC.
Speaking of Knoxville, that is where the mens team will be tomorrow. Of course the last time the two teams met, UT got a last second put back from Brian Williams to steal the win in Athens. That play was reviewed to see if he beat the buzzer which of course gave everyone many chances to view the obvious no call of Briam Williams over the back of Chris Barnes. UT has not been playing well lately although they did win their last time out against SCarolina at home. If you look at who they have beat in conference play, the win against us was probably their best win. Other wins, home against Vandy by 3, home vs. LSU, @Miss, @AU, and then home vs. SCarolina. They have lost to Arkansas on the road, Florida at home, Bama at home, at Kentuck and at Florida. All together, they have lost 5 games at home this year, so much like us, they have not been stellar at home. Course a big key to stopping UT is slowing down Scotty Hopson, their best scorer and then also Brian Williams who got the huge put back last time. Another key for them will be the play of Tobias Harris. I can't recall the last time we won in Knoxville so let's just say I will be surprised if we win this game but certainly a win Saturday or next Thursday in Gainesville would do wonders for our team. Let's hope we can keep it close and then steal one back from the ugly orange tomorrow. Game is on CBS at 1pm.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Home is not sweet, new LB coach
Well, looks like as good as we were at home last year, we are just that bad this year. Last year we were 5-3 at home in SEC play (and we beat some good teams at home-UF, UT and Vandy to name 3), the best we can be this year, 5-3 in a year that many (myself included) expected big things. I expected we would go 6-2 or 7-1 at home in conference this year and then hoped we would win 3-4 road games. As it has turned out, we have already won 3 road games to this point and now are in a must win one more road game mode as we finish the season-oh and we must beat SCarolina and LSU at home, after our past two SEC home games, neither is a gimme I can tell you that. Last night to me was all about effort. Vandy showed more hustle and effort all game long-the offensive rebounding alone, that is all about just fighting for the ball and getting after it. Our guys looked a step slow all night and even though Vandy had a horrible first half shooting, their D and rebounding kept them close enough to where they found their shooting touch in the second half-especially John Jenkins. I am really disappointed this morning because I really do think our chances of making the NCAA tourney becoming slimmer and slimmer-UNLESS we can win one of the next two games, or beat Bama to close out the SEC slate. Again, we lost to a very quality opponent so it is not considered a "bad" loss but it is becoming more and more frustrating to watch this team squander second half leads-and even though we beat Vandy on the boards up in Nashville, they KILLED us on the boards at home and that just shouldn't happen. Trey Thompkins likely will leave after this year but I will be completely honest here, he has been a big disappointment this year. He obviously has a lot of talent and of course our opponents are doubling, sometimes tripling him but he should be used to that by now-he was our best player by a long shot last year as well. I have just seen him turn the ball over, take bad shots, whine and mope about calls or about teammates playing defense or what have you, he is just not the leader I expected him to be this year. I feel like we don't have a go to player on this team-Travis is not that guy, Gerald is not that guy either, Dustin Ware is the most steady player we have but seems reluctant to take the shot when has has it at times.
Last night we had a big lead and then couldn't score down the stretch. I know a lot people thought the refs didn't help our cause, I am sure some calls were made/missed that maybe shouldn't but honestly, that game was lost in our inability to make a shot down the stretch, our inability to rebound the basketball, and Vandy just appearing to want it more. Next up is a tough road trip to Knoxville and then to Gainesville. If this team doesn't kick up their play a notch or two, I feel we have very little shot to win either of these games. The only encouraging thing to me at this point, our road record in the SEC is better than our home record, 3-2 on the road, 3-3 at home. Maybe we have a better shot to win these road games than the home games. But, you can't blame the crowd at home this year, great job by the fans. Just very depressing to watch a team fall apart that you really had high hopes for. But, as I have pointed out before and will again, even though we all think our team is talented and should win, this group of players are NOT used to winning games, they have lost more games in their careers than won on the college level. Coach Fox is not the perfect coach but to me I put these losses more on the players than the coaching-he can't make his players rebound the ball, he can't make them only take the good shots or not throw the ball away. I think he does a good job of getting them in position to make plays, then it becomes the players who have to execute. I just think he REALLY needs to continue to upgrade the talent level, hopefully that will happen sooner than later.
It appears our football staff will be complete today when Kirk Olivadotti will be named inside LB coach. This name caught me by surprise but then again, I really had not heard ANYTHING about who we might be looking at. Just seems strange to lose an assistant to the NFL and then gain his replacement from the NFL-and a guy that had spent 11 years with the Redskins, the longest tenured coach in Washington. Course Belin left us to go to the Panthers and he is NC native, also got a pay raise in the deal so I understand that. Guess hard to figure why an 11 year NFL veteran coach would want to come coach college-I have no idea what he was making with the 'skins but I can't imagine we would pay him more?? Anyway, looking at his bio, I am VERY impressed to get someone of his quality in this position. He has done good work with LB's on the pro level, he has also worked with the secondary and special teams. He has worked under some very good defensive minds and his Dad was a former NFL D coordinator. Looks like we got a good one and certainly we have a lot of questions about our LB's for this upcoming season-hopefully he will get our guys playing to their highest level. I personally think our DL and secondary will be strong this season so if our LB's can be playmakers, our D should be vastly improved.
http://www.redskins.com/gen/coaches/Kirk_Olivadotti.jsp
http://georgia.scout.com/2/1048827.html
Do you all have any thoughts/questions, if you do drop me a comment and I will be sure to discuss it with my next blog post. Not a single person to this point has left me a comment so I continue to ask for them-positive or negative feedback is welcome. As I continue to blog, I might expand to give my opinions or post links to other stories/teams besides UGA but this blog will mainly be about UGA sports, my favorite hobby in the world besides watching my kids in their activities. I am amazed to know that folks in far away places actually have checked this blog out-Denmark, Germany, Spain, Japan, New Zealand, Bahrain, South Korea, Saint Lucia and Malaysia. Thanks to everyone for stopping by and I hope you like the blog and will continue to check it out.
Last night we had a big lead and then couldn't score down the stretch. I know a lot people thought the refs didn't help our cause, I am sure some calls were made/missed that maybe shouldn't but honestly, that game was lost in our inability to make a shot down the stretch, our inability to rebound the basketball, and Vandy just appearing to want it more. Next up is a tough road trip to Knoxville and then to Gainesville. If this team doesn't kick up their play a notch or two, I feel we have very little shot to win either of these games. The only encouraging thing to me at this point, our road record in the SEC is better than our home record, 3-2 on the road, 3-3 at home. Maybe we have a better shot to win these road games than the home games. But, you can't blame the crowd at home this year, great job by the fans. Just very depressing to watch a team fall apart that you really had high hopes for. But, as I have pointed out before and will again, even though we all think our team is talented and should win, this group of players are NOT used to winning games, they have lost more games in their careers than won on the college level. Coach Fox is not the perfect coach but to me I put these losses more on the players than the coaching-he can't make his players rebound the ball, he can't make them only take the good shots or not throw the ball away. I think he does a good job of getting them in position to make plays, then it becomes the players who have to execute. I just think he REALLY needs to continue to upgrade the talent level, hopefully that will happen sooner than later.
It appears our football staff will be complete today when Kirk Olivadotti will be named inside LB coach. This name caught me by surprise but then again, I really had not heard ANYTHING about who we might be looking at. Just seems strange to lose an assistant to the NFL and then gain his replacement from the NFL-and a guy that had spent 11 years with the Redskins, the longest tenured coach in Washington. Course Belin left us to go to the Panthers and he is NC native, also got a pay raise in the deal so I understand that. Guess hard to figure why an 11 year NFL veteran coach would want to come coach college-I have no idea what he was making with the 'skins but I can't imagine we would pay him more?? Anyway, looking at his bio, I am VERY impressed to get someone of his quality in this position. He has done good work with LB's on the pro level, he has also worked with the secondary and special teams. He has worked under some very good defensive minds and his Dad was a former NFL D coordinator. Looks like we got a good one and certainly we have a lot of questions about our LB's for this upcoming season-hopefully he will get our guys playing to their highest level. I personally think our DL and secondary will be strong this season so if our LB's can be playmakers, our D should be vastly improved.
http://www.redskins.com/gen/coaches/Kirk_Olivadotti.jsp
http://georgia.scout.com/2/1048827.html
Do you all have any thoughts/questions, if you do drop me a comment and I will be sure to discuss it with my next blog post. Not a single person to this point has left me a comment so I continue to ask for them-positive or negative feedback is welcome. As I continue to blog, I might expand to give my opinions or post links to other stories/teams besides UGA but this blog will mainly be about UGA sports, my favorite hobby in the world besides watching my kids in their activities. I am amazed to know that folks in far away places actually have checked this blog out-Denmark, Germany, Spain, Japan, New Zealand, Bahrain, South Korea, Saint Lucia and Malaysia. Thanks to everyone for stopping by and I hope you like the blog and will continue to check it out.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Big game tonight, projected starters-interesting
Tonight is a big night for the mens basketball team. After winning a nail biter than never should have been last Saturday in Columbia, the Dogs are home for a second place SECe showdown with Vanderbilt tonight. Vandy is a ranked team, they have the highest RPI in the conference, they have won 3 straight (home games) and are certainly in much better shape for the NCAA than we are. That being said, the latest RPI for UGA puts us at 39, as I shared a couple days ago, most guys that predict the field have us in and not last 4 in but truly in-seeding in the 8 to 10 range. Needless to say, those guys are projecting that we will win a couple more games at least and when you get down to it, games like tonight can really be more about a potential seeding down the road both in the SEC and NCAA tourneys. Obviously, in SEC play, the winner of the game tonight takes over second place in the east. Considering we have back to back road contests at UT and UF following tonight, I think this is a must win for us. Course Vandy does go to AU on Saturday but I would rather go to AU on Saturday than to Knoxville. Not to mention, we have wins over UK and SCarolina in the east, it would be a nice resume builder to add the Vandy win, then take care of Carolina when they visit Athens as that would put our east record at 4-6 (that assumes we lose both road games coming up which I am not saying at all but reality says winning either of those will be an upset), not great but a lot better than 3-7. When it comes down to those last spots in, you never know what stat the selection committee will study. Some years it is strength of schedule, some years it is RPI, some years it is road wins, you just never know. Considering we lost tough home games to UT and UF already, it really gives us very little margin for error. The good news is, Coach Fox knows everything I have just typed. I don't know what the future holds the rest of this season, I don't know how next season will turn out either but I do know that I really like Coach Fox and the job he is doing. Granted, he must continue to build the relationships and recruit. He got Caldwell-Pope for the class of 2011, he needs a couple more studs for class of 2012 because if and when he starts getting the pick of the liter in this state, our basketball program can really take off. You have to remember, UGA hoops has NEVER dominated in-state recruiting. Even when Hugh Durham was around, or Tubby Smith, or Jim Harrick, we have never year in and year out recruited well in our home state. We will get a good player here or there but we have to consistently bring in top players every year-and not the one and done types either. Now if we get to the point of stable well put together basketball school, you can then bring in the one and done kid to make you even better but the best programs around are not built on one and done-just ask Paul Hewitt. UNC, Duke, Kansas, UCLA, Kentucky (well minus last years class), UF, Pitt, Cuse, UConn, etc etc, those programs might have a one and done kid here and there but most of those programs get the top kids that will stay a couple years or more-that is what we need to get is the kids that are excellent basketball players but not the type that are thinking NBA right out of HS-the kids that if the rule existed where they could go out of HS, they would. A player like Trey Thompkins-very highly recruited but sticks around for 3 years-that is the ideal situation. I think that is what Fox is trying to go after to be honest and I hope he is successful. He recruiting efforts for 2011, not bad but not great just because the two big men he has signed are not that highly regarded-and the fact that we are in desperate need for big bodies with our big guys leaving after this year-it just means the guys he has signed better be ready to play right away-see below for our 3 hoop signees.
Back to the game tonight, game time is 7pm on the ESPNU. Looking at Vandy over their current three game win streak, tonight will come down to our defense. John Jenkins has averaged 23pts a game over the streak, Ezeli 14, Taylor 13 and Tinsley 13. FG% averages out to 49 percent but 3pt shooting percentage, 52%-yes, that is right, 52%. Vandy has been shooting lights out, but those games have been at home of course. The last time we played them, final was 73-66, we held them to 42% FG and 35% from 3pt line, but our shooting was dreadful-34% FG and 23% from the 3pt line. Course against us, Ezeli had a double double, 18pts, 10 board. Jenkins had 18, Taylor had 14. For us, Travis led with 21 and 13 boards, Gerald with 20 and Trey with 13 and 13 boards, he was in foul trouble in that game I do believe. We actually out rebounded Vandy by 10. One VERY interesting stat, Vandy shot 20 more free throws than us, making 14 more than we did. They were 25-35 we were 11-15. I watched the game and although that is quite a big difference obviously, Vandy was more aggressive in the game and so some of that was justified. Bottom line though, we shot the ball horribly, dealt with the huge difference in FT attempts and yet only lost by 7 points. Granted Vandy didn't shoot lights out but you would like to think our D maybe had something to do with that. You also have to remember, Vandy was coming off the OT loss at SCarolina, a game where they blew a HUGE lead and thus that game against us was of vital importance to them and I think it showed in the effort they gave that night. We were coming in off our UK win btw. It will be very important we defend their 3 pt shot, something we have really struggled with our last two games at home for sure, against AU and Xavier. Auburn shot 50% from 3 land and Xavier only shot 35 but they got WIDE open looks all night long. Obviously we did a much better job in Columbia but if we can keep Vandy in the 30's percentage wise tonight, I really like our chances. Trey needs to play really well, get Ezeli on the bench, hopefully Gerald can also work on getting Jenkins in foul trouble-any advantage we can grab, we need to. Of course we really need to avoid getting our
top guys in foul trouble as well. It should be interesting and I am looking forward to a hard fought victory tonight.
I noticed this on scout, the writers there projected their starters for 2011 football team. I will offer mine as well, if you all want to share yours, feel free to do. In most cases, I agree with the other guys but I think Wooten and Samuel will be surprises. Now, I am not down on Marlon Brown, he very well might get the nod and I suspect we might run a lot of 3 wide sets, could even split Charles out as well. Amazingly, is past mid February now so it truly not that far until spring practice is here.
Kentavious Caldwell-Pope 5 stars | SG | Greenville, GAGreenville | 6'6" | 185 |
Tim Dixon 3 stars | C | Oldsmar, FLOldsmar Christian | 6'10" | 215 |
John Florveus 0 stars | C | Tampa, FLHillsborough C.C. | 7'0" | 220 |
Back to the game tonight, game time is 7pm on the ESPNU. Looking at Vandy over their current three game win streak, tonight will come down to our defense. John Jenkins has averaged 23pts a game over the streak, Ezeli 14, Taylor 13 and Tinsley 13. FG% averages out to 49 percent but 3pt shooting percentage, 52%-yes, that is right, 52%. Vandy has been shooting lights out, but those games have been at home of course. The last time we played them, final was 73-66, we held them to 42% FG and 35% from 3pt line, but our shooting was dreadful-34% FG and 23% from the 3pt line. Course against us, Ezeli had a double double, 18pts, 10 board. Jenkins had 18, Taylor had 14. For us, Travis led with 21 and 13 boards, Gerald with 20 and Trey with 13 and 13 boards, he was in foul trouble in that game I do believe. We actually out rebounded Vandy by 10. One VERY interesting stat, Vandy shot 20 more free throws than us, making 14 more than we did. They were 25-35 we were 11-15. I watched the game and although that is quite a big difference obviously, Vandy was more aggressive in the game and so some of that was justified. Bottom line though, we shot the ball horribly, dealt with the huge difference in FT attempts and yet only lost by 7 points. Granted Vandy didn't shoot lights out but you would like to think our D maybe had something to do with that. You also have to remember, Vandy was coming off the OT loss at SCarolina, a game where they blew a HUGE lead and thus that game against us was of vital importance to them and I think it showed in the effort they gave that night. We were coming in off our UK win btw. It will be very important we defend their 3 pt shot, something we have really struggled with our last two games at home for sure, against AU and Xavier. Auburn shot 50% from 3 land and Xavier only shot 35 but they got WIDE open looks all night long. Obviously we did a much better job in Columbia but if we can keep Vandy in the 30's percentage wise tonight, I really like our chances. Trey needs to play really well, get Ezeli on the bench, hopefully Gerald can also work on getting Jenkins in foul trouble-any advantage we can grab, we need to. Of course we really need to avoid getting our
top guys in foul trouble as well. It should be interesting and I am looking forward to a hard fought victory tonight.
I noticed this on scout, the writers there projected their starters for 2011 football team. I will offer mine as well, if you all want to share yours, feel free to do. In most cases, I agree with the other guys but I think Wooten and Samuel will be surprises. Now, I am not down on Marlon Brown, he very well might get the nod and I suspect we might run a lot of 3 wide sets, could even split Charles out as well. Amazingly, is past mid February now so it truly not that far until spring practice is here.
| Pos | Seth | Fletcher | Dean Haney |
| QB | Murray | Murray | Murray Murray |
| RB | Crowell* | Crowell* | Crowell* Crowell |
| FB | Ogletree | Ogletree | Figgins Figgins |
| WR | King | King | King King |
| TE | Charles | Charles | Charles Charles |
| WR | Brown | Brown | Brown Wooten |
| LT | Sturdivant | Sturdivant | Sturdivant Sturdivant |
| LG | Lee | Glenn | Gates Benedict |
| C | Jones | Jones | Jones Jones |
| RG | Glenn | Gates | Glenn Gates |
| RT | Gates | Benedict | Benedict Glenn |
| DE | Tyson | Tyson | Tyson Tyson |
| N | Jenkins* | Jenkins* | Jenkins* Jenkins |
| DE | A. Jones | A. Jones | A. Jones A. Jones |
| OLB | Washington | J. Jones | J. Jones Washington |
| MLB | Robinson | Robinson | Robinson Robinson |
| MLB | J. Jones | Gilliard | Gilliard Samuel |
| OLB | Drew* | Washington | Drew* J. Jones |
| CB | Boykin | Boykin | Boykin Boykin |
| CB | Smith | Commings | Commings Commings |
| S | Ogletree | Ogletree | Ogletree Ogletree |
| S | Rambo | Rambo | Rambo Rambo |
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Early look at class of 2012, Baseball ready to start
So the Dream team is now in the books, it is time to start looking at next year as recruiting starts so early now, wouldn't surprise me if soon we are talking about 8th-9th graders being heavily recruited. Crazy to me but oh well. Here is a list from Rivals, top 250 for 2012, I believe there are 15 or 16 Ga kids on the list. One, Dakota Ball, has already committed to Bama. Several others on the list I have read have family connections also to Bama. Let me just say, I know all about the tradition of Alabama football, the Bear, national titles etc etc, but to me looking through my red and black glasses, UGA offers just as much if not more for in state kids-a better education for one, a chance to stay in your home state and make connections which will pay off in future years, great facilities, stadium, UGA offers a rich football tradition as well, beautful campus and women, all things being equal, I am just having a hard time figuring how why all the sudden Bama has become so appealing for so many Ga kids. I guess I am just not used to it, I almost expect AU, SC, Clem, Tenn, and UF/FSU in South Georgia to come and attract some of our talent-in many cases those schools are much closer to the kid than is UGA. But Bama, they are a new player on the scene thanks in large part to Kirby Smart. Anyway, here is hoping that we have a strong year this year, Bama struggles and we get Dream Team II coming to Athens next Feb.
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/recruiting/rankings/rank-2851
My son has his first baseball practice today, Braves pitchers and catcher have their first workout today, the weather in the ATL is beautiful, highs in the mid 60's. This means baseball is in the air. Certainly is the case in Athens where Dave Perno tries to get the program back to the level it was a couple years ago, at the College World Series. Last year was HORRIBLE, 16-37 and the culprit was an incredibly high 8.48 team ERA but I also thought the team just had no pop-the year before we have big bats and last year it was almost like we were using wiffle ball bats. The starting OF should be pretty good with Zach Cone, Jonathan Taylor and Peter Verdin back, also Colby May should be back to full strength after having nagging injuries last year-he was big for us back two years ago on the CWS team. Also, hopeful we can get some power from Chase Davidson who had a lot of injury problems last year as well. This kid was good enough to be drafted in the 3rd round out of high school, this being his JR year in college, this is a big year for that kid. Of course the pitching has got to improve and I am not as optimistic about the staff as I am about the offense. If you look at the starting pitchers for the upcoming weekend series, downright scary numbers-Michael Palazzone(4-6, 8.66 ERA in 2010), Alex Wood-no stats from last year-maybe that is a positive, Ben Cornwell (1-1, 15.68). This weekend UGA takes on Stetson down in Deland, Florida. This is NO gimme series as Stetson is a regular in the NCAA tourney. A couple of interesting series in Athens will be Baylor the weekend of 25th, and then FSU the weekend of 3/4. We also make a trip to Los Angeles to take on UCLA, USC and Saint Mary's in Dodger Stadium. We also play Bama on March 9th at Coolray field-home of the Gwinnett Braves. First SEC weekend series is weekend of March 18th, at South Carolina. For those wondering when we play the Nerds, well that would be March 22nd in Athens, April 12th in Atlanta, April 26th at Turner Field. SEC tourney will start May 25th, once again in Hoover, Alabama. As the baseball season progresses, I will certainly be keeping a eye out on the team. I love baseball, that was my sport growing up so obviously I follow college baseball and pro baseball with the Braves. So, you might catch some Braves stuff here from time to time during the slow/down times.
Tomorrow of course is the biggie in Athens, UGA/Vandy in the rematch. I am not going to go into a detailed scouting report of Vandy this time, just try to look at what they have been up to lately, who has been playing well etc. To be at 7-4 in SEC play with 5 games to play, that would allow our guys the luxury of relaxing as we hit the tough back to back. This is not to say that means we would not try to win the games, just simply that it should take the pressure of HAVE to win the game off their mind and in that sense, maybe help them just play basketball and not sweat the small stuff. I believe sometimes, teams respond well to pressure and then sometimes teams obviously don't. But most teams WILL play better when they are just relaxed, having fun and just playing the game. Our team has a 3-2 SEC record on the road so far this year, even the two losses were not blow outs, so this team does have some confidence to win on the road. Now, we are also 3-2 at home, we really need to close out strong winning these last 3 home games. That starts tomorrow night.
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/recruiting/rankings/rank-2851
My son has his first baseball practice today, Braves pitchers and catcher have their first workout today, the weather in the ATL is beautiful, highs in the mid 60's. This means baseball is in the air. Certainly is the case in Athens where Dave Perno tries to get the program back to the level it was a couple years ago, at the College World Series. Last year was HORRIBLE, 16-37 and the culprit was an incredibly high 8.48 team ERA but I also thought the team just had no pop-the year before we have big bats and last year it was almost like we were using wiffle ball bats. The starting OF should be pretty good with Zach Cone, Jonathan Taylor and Peter Verdin back, also Colby May should be back to full strength after having nagging injuries last year-he was big for us back two years ago on the CWS team. Also, hopeful we can get some power from Chase Davidson who had a lot of injury problems last year as well. This kid was good enough to be drafted in the 3rd round out of high school, this being his JR year in college, this is a big year for that kid. Of course the pitching has got to improve and I am not as optimistic about the staff as I am about the offense. If you look at the starting pitchers for the upcoming weekend series, downright scary numbers-Michael Palazzone(4-6, 8.66 ERA in 2010), Alex Wood-no stats from last year-maybe that is a positive, Ben Cornwell (1-1, 15.68). This weekend UGA takes on Stetson down in Deland, Florida. This is NO gimme series as Stetson is a regular in the NCAA tourney. A couple of interesting series in Athens will be Baylor the weekend of 25th, and then FSU the weekend of 3/4. We also make a trip to Los Angeles to take on UCLA, USC and Saint Mary's in Dodger Stadium. We also play Bama on March 9th at Coolray field-home of the Gwinnett Braves. First SEC weekend series is weekend of March 18th, at South Carolina. For those wondering when we play the Nerds, well that would be March 22nd in Athens, April 12th in Atlanta, April 26th at Turner Field. SEC tourney will start May 25th, once again in Hoover, Alabama. As the baseball season progresses, I will certainly be keeping a eye out on the team. I love baseball, that was my sport growing up so obviously I follow college baseball and pro baseball with the Braves. So, you might catch some Braves stuff here from time to time during the slow/down times.
Tomorrow of course is the biggie in Athens, UGA/Vandy in the rematch. I am not going to go into a detailed scouting report of Vandy this time, just try to look at what they have been up to lately, who has been playing well etc. To be at 7-4 in SEC play with 5 games to play, that would allow our guys the luxury of relaxing as we hit the tough back to back. This is not to say that means we would not try to win the games, just simply that it should take the pressure of HAVE to win the game off their mind and in that sense, maybe help them just play basketball and not sweat the small stuff. I believe sometimes, teams respond well to pressure and then sometimes teams obviously don't. But most teams WILL play better when they are just relaxed, having fun and just playing the game. Our team has a 3-2 SEC record on the road so far this year, even the two losses were not blow outs, so this team does have some confidence to win on the road. Now, we are also 3-2 at home, we really need to close out strong winning these last 3 home games. That starts tomorrow night.
Monday, February 14, 2011
Let's look at some projected brackets
First up, Joe Lunardi's bracket, last updated on Friday, 2/11. He has us a #11 seed, playing #6 seed Missouri, win that game you get the winner of #3 Purdue against #14 Fairfield.
http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/bracketology
He has us playing in Tampa, part of the New Orleans-Southeast bracket. Let me tell you something, I would take this in a heartbeat. Mizzou and Purdue are super teams but they would not scare me nearly as much as some of the other #3 seeds-Villanova, Wisconsin, Georgetown are the 3's and Illinois, Vandy, West Va are the other 6's.
Here is another one, last updated on Feb 8th, before we lost to Xavier but also of course before we beat SCarolina, has us #8 seed playing #9 UCLA, winner to play #1 Pitt-not a fan of that bracket to be honest.
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/bracketology
Here is one that has us a #10 seed (updated 2/11), does not provide who we would play but if you look at the 7 seeds, our opponent would be one of the following-Temple, Illinois, Minnesota, and UNLV. I would be fine with any of those opponents, love to get another shot at Temple, we beat Illinois last year, Tubby coaches at Minn, and UNLV doesn't scare me either.
http://bracketproject.50webs.com/matrix.htm
Yet another has us a #9 seed playing #8 Cincy, winner to face #1 Ohio State. DO NOT like that one at all, so let's just forget I mentioned it-this one also updated on 2/11.
http://walterfootball.com/bracketology.php
There were a few others I looked at but they were not updated since Jan or just didn't look worthy. The most important thing I noticed is that every bracket I looked at had UGA in the tourney. THAT in itself is a promising thing. Granted a lot can happen between now and selection Sunday but there is no doubt that we appear to be on the minds of most when it comes to projecting the field-our numbers are strong enough currently to get us in. What this means is we simply can't afford to lose to SCarolina and LSU at home. Then, we really need to win against Vandy at home or Bama on the road. I feel sure that 9-7 gets us strong consideration. 10-6 gets us in regardless of the SEC tourney. At 9-7, we very well might get in without a win in the SEC tourney but a win there and I think we for sure get in. If we go 8-8, I think we probably need to at least reach the SEC title game, if not win the tourney. You think about 8-8, that would mean we go 2-4 down the stretch which is hardly encouraging to the selection committee. It would also mean we would be only 5-3 at home in SEC play, we would have lost 4 home games in 2011, we would have a record of 8-9 in 2011. I just don't think there is any way we could justify making the tourney at 8-8 if we didn't win the conference tourney.
Needless to say, the game Wednesday night is huge. Vandy is tied with us for second on the SECe, they beat us earlier this year in Nashville, they have an RPI of 11, they have won 3 games in a row-all at home I might add, they are ranked in the top 25. We have not beat an opponent on the level of Vandy all year because you have to discount the UK win a little now since they seem unable to beat anyone on the road to this point in SEC play. Let's just hope the team can put together a complete game effort much like we witnessed against Kentucky back in early January. If we can win this game, then win the two home games we should handle, I think we can sneak another road win-not sure where but I think it is possible.
Ok, I want to take a minute to thank everyone for reading my blog. I am amazed people take the time to read my opinions here. I hope you do enjoy it and I also ask again, if you have any questions or comments, PLEASE share. I always welcome feedback and questions. I believe I have enabled the comments section to allow you to post without a username so feel free to drop me a line. I have two followers, I want to thank those guys. To be honest, I am not sure what the means except to say, they like to come by and visit my blog and read my thoughts/opinions, so much so they follow my blog on a regular basis-maybe you two guys can clue me in on what a follower truly is. It makes me feel important so thanks to Timothy and Letherblog. Thanks to everyone again, Happy Valentine's Day!
http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/bracketology
He has us playing in Tampa, part of the New Orleans-Southeast bracket. Let me tell you something, I would take this in a heartbeat. Mizzou and Purdue are super teams but they would not scare me nearly as much as some of the other #3 seeds-Villanova, Wisconsin, Georgetown are the 3's and Illinois, Vandy, West Va are the other 6's.
Here is another one, last updated on Feb 8th, before we lost to Xavier but also of course before we beat SCarolina, has us #8 seed playing #9 UCLA, winner to play #1 Pitt-not a fan of that bracket to be honest.
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/bracketology
Here is one that has us a #10 seed (updated 2/11), does not provide who we would play but if you look at the 7 seeds, our opponent would be one of the following-Temple, Illinois, Minnesota, and UNLV. I would be fine with any of those opponents, love to get another shot at Temple, we beat Illinois last year, Tubby coaches at Minn, and UNLV doesn't scare me either.
http://bracketproject.50webs.com/matrix.htm
Yet another has us a #9 seed playing #8 Cincy, winner to face #1 Ohio State. DO NOT like that one at all, so let's just forget I mentioned it-this one also updated on 2/11.
http://walterfootball.com/bracketology.php
There were a few others I looked at but they were not updated since Jan or just didn't look worthy. The most important thing I noticed is that every bracket I looked at had UGA in the tourney. THAT in itself is a promising thing. Granted a lot can happen between now and selection Sunday but there is no doubt that we appear to be on the minds of most when it comes to projecting the field-our numbers are strong enough currently to get us in. What this means is we simply can't afford to lose to SCarolina and LSU at home. Then, we really need to win against Vandy at home or Bama on the road. I feel sure that 9-7 gets us strong consideration. 10-6 gets us in regardless of the SEC tourney. At 9-7, we very well might get in without a win in the SEC tourney but a win there and I think we for sure get in. If we go 8-8, I think we probably need to at least reach the SEC title game, if not win the tourney. You think about 8-8, that would mean we go 2-4 down the stretch which is hardly encouraging to the selection committee. It would also mean we would be only 5-3 at home in SEC play, we would have lost 4 home games in 2011, we would have a record of 8-9 in 2011. I just don't think there is any way we could justify making the tourney at 8-8 if we didn't win the conference tourney.
Needless to say, the game Wednesday night is huge. Vandy is tied with us for second on the SECe, they beat us earlier this year in Nashville, they have an RPI of 11, they have won 3 games in a row-all at home I might add, they are ranked in the top 25. We have not beat an opponent on the level of Vandy all year because you have to discount the UK win a little now since they seem unable to beat anyone on the road to this point in SEC play. Let's just hope the team can put together a complete game effort much like we witnessed against Kentucky back in early January. If we can win this game, then win the two home games we should handle, I think we can sneak another road win-not sure where but I think it is possible.
Ok, I want to take a minute to thank everyone for reading my blog. I am amazed people take the time to read my opinions here. I hope you do enjoy it and I also ask again, if you have any questions or comments, PLEASE share. I always welcome feedback and questions. I believe I have enabled the comments section to allow you to post without a username so feel free to drop me a line. I have two followers, I want to thank those guys. To be honest, I am not sure what the means except to say, they like to come by and visit my blog and read my thoughts/opinions, so much so they follow my blog on a regular basis-maybe you two guys can clue me in on what a follower truly is. It makes me feel important so thanks to Timothy and Letherblog. Thanks to everyone again, Happy Valentine's Day!
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Almost disaster but I'll take it
Ok, so the mens hoop team almost pulled an all time choke job over in Columbia yesterday BUT, they didn't. Yes, no doubt this is cause for concern to some degree but I am choosing to look at the positive. The positive is that we got another road win, a game we HAD to have to continue the quest for the NCAA tourney. How many times have you seen a team take a big lead and then get very complacent-it happens quite often and that is what happened yesterday. SCarolina just couldn't throw it in the ocean in the first half but in the second half they found their shot a little bit, they created some turnovers and we just didn't take care of business, which allowed them to come from 23 down to trailing by only 2. But, all that being said, the team managed to hold the Gamecocks from taking the game from us-great block by Trey Thompkins at the end, Gerald then hit a free throw to ice it. Trey led the way with 16 points, Travis with 13, we finally got those two guys to play a solid game toghether. We will need that and more to win what is setting us as another HUGE home game on Wed night against Vandy.
One thing everyone needs to remember when it comes to this team though, even though we all believe that maybe our record should be better or that our players are not playing up to their potential every game-this team is still not used to winning. Think about it, two years ago they were 12-20, last year 14-18, I mean this is not a team that expects to win at this point I don't believe-I still think they HOPE to win. Coach Fox has done his best to get that winning attitude going in Athens but this is a team that besides Price and Barnes, have NEVER played in even the NIT tourney. Trey, Travis, Gerald, all the young guys, they have not been winning college basketball players during their careers to this point. Not trying make excuses for them at all but I do think that is something I tend to forget from time to time. Perhaps my expectations for this team are greater than what should be considered realistic. Last year they won some really big home games but couldn't get over the hump on the road. This year, they have won now 3 SEC road games which after last year is quite a jump. Of course here lately they have lost some crucial home games but I do expect that they will play tough at home down the stretch and if that happens, a 9-7 conference record will be there for us. That might not get us in the tourney but it very well could get us in-certainly if we could pull another win on the road-at UT, UF or Bama, then win the three home games, I feel 99.9% sure we make it in regardless of what happens in the SEC tourney.
Next up as I mentioned is Vandy, the team we are currently tied with for second in the SECe. A win over the Dores, we sit at 7-4 as we head for the back to back UT and UF road games. Those appear to be tough for us to win considering we couldn't beat them at home but certainly we can play with both those school and you simply never know if we might pull off the huge upset. I posted last week I felt the NIT was looking more and more likely, but if this team can find ways to win, go 4-2 down the home stretch, they will be dancing this year, and to me that is a big step in the Mark Fox rebuilding project. I am not sure what to expect next year but this year could still be a very positive step forward but we have to take care of Vandy on Wed night, lose that one and suddenly we can't protect our house-that would make it 4 losses out of our last 5 games inside the Steg. If you had told me before the season we would be winning games on the road but struggling to win games at home, I would have said you are crazy. But, currently that is what has been happening.
Still no word on a new defensive coach to join the staff, I would expect something to be announced this week but there has been very little speculation at all surrounding that coaching position-really has surprised me to be honest. There was a lot more talk about the OL hire for sure.
One thing everyone needs to remember when it comes to this team though, even though we all believe that maybe our record should be better or that our players are not playing up to their potential every game-this team is still not used to winning. Think about it, two years ago they were 12-20, last year 14-18, I mean this is not a team that expects to win at this point I don't believe-I still think they HOPE to win. Coach Fox has done his best to get that winning attitude going in Athens but this is a team that besides Price and Barnes, have NEVER played in even the NIT tourney. Trey, Travis, Gerald, all the young guys, they have not been winning college basketball players during their careers to this point. Not trying make excuses for them at all but I do think that is something I tend to forget from time to time. Perhaps my expectations for this team are greater than what should be considered realistic. Last year they won some really big home games but couldn't get over the hump on the road. This year, they have won now 3 SEC road games which after last year is quite a jump. Of course here lately they have lost some crucial home games but I do expect that they will play tough at home down the stretch and if that happens, a 9-7 conference record will be there for us. That might not get us in the tourney but it very well could get us in-certainly if we could pull another win on the road-at UT, UF or Bama, then win the three home games, I feel 99.9% sure we make it in regardless of what happens in the SEC tourney.
Next up as I mentioned is Vandy, the team we are currently tied with for second in the SECe. A win over the Dores, we sit at 7-4 as we head for the back to back UT and UF road games. Those appear to be tough for us to win considering we couldn't beat them at home but certainly we can play with both those school and you simply never know if we might pull off the huge upset. I posted last week I felt the NIT was looking more and more likely, but if this team can find ways to win, go 4-2 down the home stretch, they will be dancing this year, and to me that is a big step in the Mark Fox rebuilding project. I am not sure what to expect next year but this year could still be a very positive step forward but we have to take care of Vandy on Wed night, lose that one and suddenly we can't protect our house-that would make it 4 losses out of our last 5 games inside the Steg. If you had told me before the season we would be winning games on the road but struggling to win games at home, I would have said you are crazy. But, currently that is what has been happening.
Still no word on a new defensive coach to join the staff, I would expect something to be announced this week but there has been very little speculation at all surrounding that coaching position-really has surprised me to be honest. There was a lot more talk about the OL hire for sure.
Friday, February 11, 2011
Up next, South Carolina, also we have a McDonalds ALL AMERICAN!!
Last night, the SECe became even more jumbled, with Vandy beating Alabama in Nashville, 81-77. I watched some of the first half and I have to say, Bama really is better than I had anticipated-they have a lot of good looking basketball players-I don't think they are a great perimeter team but they have a nice looking young point guard and a couple solid scorers in Green and Mitchell. I know Fox likes the M2M D but I would seriously consider zoning Bama until they hit some outside shots. Ok, enough on Bama but honestly I do think when push comes to shove, it very well could be UGA vs. Bama for the last SEC spot in the big dance. I would love it if Miss State beats them tomorrow. Course I also will pull for Kentucky to beat Vandy, considering I think Kentucky is a lock to make the tourney, we have to pull against Vandy and Tenn in the east.
Up next for us of course is the last place team in the SECe, South Carolina. But, don't let that fool you. This team is DANGEROUS and we never play well in Columbia, SC-regardless of the sport. They are only a game behind us in the SEC standings, overall record of 13-9 and SEC mark of 4-5. They have lost 4 of that last 5 SEC games, last one being a 19 point loss at home against UF on Wed night. If you look at their season, you see losses at Mich State, at Ohio State, at Furman-we almost lost to Mercer remember, home against Boston College, at Bama, Kentucky at home, Auburn at home-we almost did the same thing, at Vandy and home vs. UF. They do have wins against Clemson, Vandy, at Florida, Arkansas, and at LSU. During their current down stretch, they have been getting beat pretty badly, Kentucky beat them by 11, Auburn by 15, they beat LSU by 8, Vandy beat them by 18 and then UF by 19. This is quite simply a young team and right now they are down and out. We need to keep them down and out but with how we are playing right now, who really knows if we can.
Taking a look at the SCarolina headliners, they are lead by FR point guard Bruce Ellington, a 5'9" kid that is lightning quick-averages 14.4pts a game and 3.4 assists. Next is 6'2" Soph guard Ramon Galloway who averages 10.7pts a game, next is forward Sam Muldrow a 6'9" forward and senior leader, who also averages 10.7 pts per game and 7.2 rebounds. Next is junior foward, 6'5" Malik Cooke who averages 8.7pts and 6.4 rebounds a game. Last is Lakeem Jackson, a 6'5" soph that averages 8.7pts and 6.2 rebounds. Key player off the bench appears to be Brian Richardson, a 6'4" guard that averages 7pts a game and gets about 21 minutes a game. Others on the bench average 14 or less minutes and 3pts or less so not worth a mention. Of their key players, Ellington shoots the three at the highest percentage, 35.8%. Malik Cooke leads them in FT percentage at 75%, all other starters are under 70%, the two starting guards are both at right about 64%. Muldrow is a force when it comes to blocking shots, he has 75 blocks on the season.
Simply put, we have a lot more talent than these guys. But, we had a lot more talent than AU and they nearly beat us. Having more talent means NOTHING when you get out on the court. I have been very disappointed in our play really since the UF game-second OT. I thought our effort at the end of regulation and the 1st OT was outstanding but to me there is NO EXCUSE in coming out flat/dejected/tired or whatever other excuse in that second OT. Chandler Parsons showed more effort himself than any player we had on the floor, and that as he was very sick coming into that game. Course we followed that up with the UK loss, you never expect to win at UK so the fact we lost is not what bothered me but rather the lack of focus/effort by our two stars, Thompkins and Leslie. We had the win at Arkansas which was a must have, but the first half of that game and really all game, very sloppy. But, a big win and you can never discount that. We followed that up with the performance against AU, then the game against Xavier. It is not that I thought we played bad against Xavier, but rather I thought we have better overall talent-also, we had so many self inflicted problems that night, turnovers, poor shot selection, missing easy shots, just things that quality basketball teams should NOT be doing in February, especially when they have strong desire to make the NCAA tourney.
So now we play another road game where a win is a near must. Simply put, you must beat the teams you should beat, and losing to SCarolina on Saturday would put us in a position we have not been in all year, a loss to non quality opponent, ie a BAD loss. We have lost 7 games thus far but all 7 losses have been to teams that have a high RPI. South Carolina does NOT have a high RPI. A loss to SCarolina, home or away, a loss to LSU, those would spell doom I am afraid. We shall see what happens but hopefully our team comes out focused and ready to play tomorrow. Game is at 4pm on the SECN, Peachtree TV in the ATL area.
A very positive note for UGA hoops, signee Kentavious Caldwell-Pope made the McDonalds All American team. He is the first UGA signee to make the team since Louis Williams back in 2005-course Lou never suited up in the Athens while KCP will next fall. Here is a look at the roster and more information about the game.
http://www.mcdonaldsallamerican.com/2011_BoysRosterAlph.pdf
http://www.mcdonaldsallamerican.com/2011/
Game will take place March 30th in Chicago, it will air live on ESPN at 9pm. Sure is nice to see a kid coming to UGA on the roster, when you see Kentucky, Ohio State, Duke, Louisville, Michigan State, and North Carolina listed for most of these kids. We need to continue to recruit talented kids each and every year and I think our program can finally take that big step forward. Course it would be great to have Kentavious and Trey together for one year, that is a serious inside/outside game right there. But, I feel sure Trey will leave after this year so hopefully one of our other big guys coming in can be decent and another year will do Donte Williams and Marcus Thornton a lot of good. We certainly will be expecting more out of them next year than what we expect from them this year.
One other note, I have been a big proponent of Connor Nolte getting more PT and I still feel that way. Connor is not the most talented player on our roster but I would rather have him shooting threes and Trey rebounding than Connor on the bench and Trey shooting threes. Nolte is a kid that knows HOW to play basketball which means he makes the most of his time on the court-and he does the little things that sometimes you might not notice-saves a ball from going out of bounds, tips it to a teammate, makes a great pass, gets a strong rebound, draws a charge. The kid just hustles and busts his rear when he gets a shot to play. I think that type effort should be rewarded with more PT myself. I also think that type attitude and effort can be contagious. I hope Coach Fox will seriously consider playing him a few minutes here and there, every time Jeremy Price, Trey Thompkins, Chris Barnes, or Travis Leslie lose focus-whether just not hustling, complaining about a foul call that didn't go their way, commits a stupid or lazy foul or a lazy/bad turnover, I say insert Connor and let those guys sit for a minute-catch their breath and then get them back in the game. Sitting a guy out for a few minutes to calm down and watch from a distance can be a very powerful and productive thing. I think Connor, also Marcus Thornton and Donte Williams need to grab a few minutes here and there myself.
Up next for us of course is the last place team in the SECe, South Carolina. But, don't let that fool you. This team is DANGEROUS and we never play well in Columbia, SC-regardless of the sport. They are only a game behind us in the SEC standings, overall record of 13-9 and SEC mark of 4-5. They have lost 4 of that last 5 SEC games, last one being a 19 point loss at home against UF on Wed night. If you look at their season, you see losses at Mich State, at Ohio State, at Furman-we almost lost to Mercer remember, home against Boston College, at Bama, Kentucky at home, Auburn at home-we almost did the same thing, at Vandy and home vs. UF. They do have wins against Clemson, Vandy, at Florida, Arkansas, and at LSU. During their current down stretch, they have been getting beat pretty badly, Kentucky beat them by 11, Auburn by 15, they beat LSU by 8, Vandy beat them by 18 and then UF by 19. This is quite simply a young team and right now they are down and out. We need to keep them down and out but with how we are playing right now, who really knows if we can.
Taking a look at the SCarolina headliners, they are lead by FR point guard Bruce Ellington, a 5'9" kid that is lightning quick-averages 14.4pts a game and 3.4 assists. Next is 6'2" Soph guard Ramon Galloway who averages 10.7pts a game, next is forward Sam Muldrow a 6'9" forward and senior leader, who also averages 10.7 pts per game and 7.2 rebounds. Next is junior foward, 6'5" Malik Cooke who averages 8.7pts and 6.4 rebounds a game. Last is Lakeem Jackson, a 6'5" soph that averages 8.7pts and 6.2 rebounds. Key player off the bench appears to be Brian Richardson, a 6'4" guard that averages 7pts a game and gets about 21 minutes a game. Others on the bench average 14 or less minutes and 3pts or less so not worth a mention. Of their key players, Ellington shoots the three at the highest percentage, 35.8%. Malik Cooke leads them in FT percentage at 75%, all other starters are under 70%, the two starting guards are both at right about 64%. Muldrow is a force when it comes to blocking shots, he has 75 blocks on the season.
Simply put, we have a lot more talent than these guys. But, we had a lot more talent than AU and they nearly beat us. Having more talent means NOTHING when you get out on the court. I have been very disappointed in our play really since the UF game-second OT. I thought our effort at the end of regulation and the 1st OT was outstanding but to me there is NO EXCUSE in coming out flat/dejected/tired or whatever other excuse in that second OT. Chandler Parsons showed more effort himself than any player we had on the floor, and that as he was very sick coming into that game. Course we followed that up with the UK loss, you never expect to win at UK so the fact we lost is not what bothered me but rather the lack of focus/effort by our two stars, Thompkins and Leslie. We had the win at Arkansas which was a must have, but the first half of that game and really all game, very sloppy. But, a big win and you can never discount that. We followed that up with the performance against AU, then the game against Xavier. It is not that I thought we played bad against Xavier, but rather I thought we have better overall talent-also, we had so many self inflicted problems that night, turnovers, poor shot selection, missing easy shots, just things that quality basketball teams should NOT be doing in February, especially when they have strong desire to make the NCAA tourney.
So now we play another road game where a win is a near must. Simply put, you must beat the teams you should beat, and losing to SCarolina on Saturday would put us in a position we have not been in all year, a loss to non quality opponent, ie a BAD loss. We have lost 7 games thus far but all 7 losses have been to teams that have a high RPI. South Carolina does NOT have a high RPI. A loss to SCarolina, home or away, a loss to LSU, those would spell doom I am afraid. We shall see what happens but hopefully our team comes out focused and ready to play tomorrow. Game is at 4pm on the SECN, Peachtree TV in the ATL area.
A very positive note for UGA hoops, signee Kentavious Caldwell-Pope made the McDonalds All American team. He is the first UGA signee to make the team since Louis Williams back in 2005-course Lou never suited up in the Athens while KCP will next fall. Here is a look at the roster and more information about the game.
http://www.mcdonaldsallamerican.com/2011_BoysRosterAlph.pdf
http://www.mcdonaldsallamerican.com/2011/
Game will take place March 30th in Chicago, it will air live on ESPN at 9pm. Sure is nice to see a kid coming to UGA on the roster, when you see Kentucky, Ohio State, Duke, Louisville, Michigan State, and North Carolina listed for most of these kids. We need to continue to recruit talented kids each and every year and I think our program can finally take that big step forward. Course it would be great to have Kentavious and Trey together for one year, that is a serious inside/outside game right there. But, I feel sure Trey will leave after this year so hopefully one of our other big guys coming in can be decent and another year will do Donte Williams and Marcus Thornton a lot of good. We certainly will be expecting more out of them next year than what we expect from them this year.
One other note, I have been a big proponent of Connor Nolte getting more PT and I still feel that way. Connor is not the most talented player on our roster but I would rather have him shooting threes and Trey rebounding than Connor on the bench and Trey shooting threes. Nolte is a kid that knows HOW to play basketball which means he makes the most of his time on the court-and he does the little things that sometimes you might not notice-saves a ball from going out of bounds, tips it to a teammate, makes a great pass, gets a strong rebound, draws a charge. The kid just hustles and busts his rear when he gets a shot to play. I think that type effort should be rewarded with more PT myself. I also think that type attitude and effort can be contagious. I hope Coach Fox will seriously consider playing him a few minutes here and there, every time Jeremy Price, Trey Thompkins, Chris Barnes, or Travis Leslie lose focus-whether just not hustling, complaining about a foul call that didn't go their way, commits a stupid or lazy foul or a lazy/bad turnover, I say insert Connor and let those guys sit for a minute-catch their breath and then get them back in the game. Sitting a guy out for a few minutes to calm down and watch from a distance can be a very powerful and productive thing. I think Connor, also Marcus Thornton and Donte Williams need to grab a few minutes here and there myself.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Ok, let's take a look at SEC basketball
First of all, as we sit here at just about the half way point of the SEC season you have to start thinking about just how many spots will the SEC get in the NCAA tourney. The way we are playing right now, I think we head to the NIT but if you really look at it, you might have to put our odds more at 50-50 as of now. Considering the field is now 68, considering just how poor the ACC is this year, how average the middle of the Big10 is right now, Big12, Pac10 etc, it is not a stretch to think the SEC can and will get 5 teams in the dance. So now let's take a look at the SEC standings as they are right now-
East SEC Overall West SEC Overall
UF 8-2 19-5 Bama 7-1 15-7
UK 5-4 17-6 MSU 5-4 13-10
UG 5-4 16-7 Miss 4-5 16-8
UT 5-4 15-9 Ark 4-6 14-9
VU 4-4 16-6 LSU 2-7 10-14
SC 4-5 13-9 AU 1-8 8-15
RPI index, UK 12, UF 13, Vandy 21, Tenn 26, UGA 44, Miss 57-that is all from the SEC in the top 68. So with all that said, you have to figure UF, UK and Vandy will make it just based on overall record and RPI-well, UF looks good everywhere, UK so so when it comes to conference but hey, they are UK so they are in right now. Bama leads the west by a large margin but RPI for them is not good, not sure their exact number but obviously not in the top 68. We should get the nod over Miss at this point certainly based on our head to head at their place. UT also should make it based on RPI and SOS as well, that win against Pitt is HUGE for them. So, what I am trying to say is this, to me our enemies right now are Bama and Vandy and we play both schools down the stretch, Vandy at home and Bama on the road. Those will be huge games for us, especially Vandy at home.
Looking at schedules down the stretch, Vandy plays host to Bama tonight-good for us as one will get another loss. Vandy also still plays us in Athens, has two games left with Kentucky, home game vs Tenn, home game vs. UF. Road games at AU, LSU, and Kentucky. Vandy certainly has an easier schedule than we do, which makes our game vs. them huge for us. Let's assume they lose to us and UK, that gives them 6 conference losses, let's hope that UF and maybe UK can beat them in Nashville OR somehow AU or LSU upsets them at home. I would suspect they SHOULD finish around 9-7 to 8-8 in conference if I were to guess. Let's hope 8-8.
As for Bama, considering they are in the west, they should be able to cruise to a division title at this point, as they have 3 game lead. They have a cake schedule the rest of the way to be honest but that schedule is NOT going to help them with their RPI either. They still have the game at Vandy, they host us of course, and also play at UF and Ole Miss, they have a game at LSU, homes games against Miss, AU and Arkansas. Let's assume they win at LSU, and all home games but us, that gives them 4 more wins for 19 wins and a 11-5 conference mark. If we can get to 9-7 in conference, that would give us 20 wins and should get us in ahead of Bama, although if we lose to them, that might tip the scales in Bama's favor.
If you want to look at UT, since they have the same conference record and already have 9 losses, they have a game at UF coming up Saturday but after that, they can really get on a roll with most games in Knoxville and Pearl is back on sidelines now. They host South Carolina, then us, then travel to Nashville, then host Miss State, then go to SCarolina before hosting UK. Honestly, unless we beat them up there or UK beats them up there, you have to figure they go at worst 9-7 which gets them in.
I think now you can see why those two home losses in conference could REALLY kill us. Now, we have picked up two road conference wins which could help us end up at 8-8, but we really need to get the win at SCarolina on Saturday before we play Vandy next week. We could be 7-4 heading into the back to back UT and UF games which is really where we need to be honestly. We should be able to get the win over LSU and SCarolina at home which would get us to 9 wins, steal either the UT, UF or Bama games and we get to 10-6 which really helps our chances of getting in-in fact I think 10-6 and we are guaranteed a spot. With the way we are playing at the moment though, NOTHING is guaranteed. Winning Saturday and then following that up with the win against Vandy could really do wonders for us folks and if that happens, we could still be in good shape for the dance. Thing is, we KNOW we can beat UT, UF and Vandy, we played all three close games, just got to get over the hump.
We have not heard a thing about possible candidates for our vacant LB or DE position-is that because the job has to be vacant for two weeks?? Seems strange that it has a week now and I have read NOTHING on who might be a candidate. I guess with it following national signing day, it kind of has been lost in the shuffle. I honestly don't know who they might consider but as I have said before, I suspect Grantham will have a lot of input on who ends up being hired. He was heavily involved in hiring Lakatos and Belin last year after he arrived and he is the coordinator. Sounds like Bobo was a big part of the hiring of Will Friend-per Friend Bobo made the first contact with him. This guy MUST be highly thought of (at least in the mind of Mike Bobo) for him to think of this guy immediately after Searels left the program. Hopefully he will be a good hire, sometimes the guys you have not really heard much about end up being the best assistant coaches. We were all THRILLED when Searels was hired but I know personally, I was THRILLED when he left town as well. I also remember when Richt was hired and he hired Brian Van Gorder as his DC, we all were scratching our heads, he turned out to be pretty darn good.
East SEC Overall West SEC Overall
UF 8-2 19-5 Bama 7-1 15-7
UK 5-4 17-6 MSU 5-4 13-10
UG 5-4 16-7 Miss 4-5 16-8
UT 5-4 15-9 Ark 4-6 14-9
VU 4-4 16-6 LSU 2-7 10-14
SC 4-5 13-9 AU 1-8 8-15
RPI index, UK 12, UF 13, Vandy 21, Tenn 26, UGA 44, Miss 57-that is all from the SEC in the top 68. So with all that said, you have to figure UF, UK and Vandy will make it just based on overall record and RPI-well, UF looks good everywhere, UK so so when it comes to conference but hey, they are UK so they are in right now. Bama leads the west by a large margin but RPI for them is not good, not sure their exact number but obviously not in the top 68. We should get the nod over Miss at this point certainly based on our head to head at their place. UT also should make it based on RPI and SOS as well, that win against Pitt is HUGE for them. So, what I am trying to say is this, to me our enemies right now are Bama and Vandy and we play both schools down the stretch, Vandy at home and Bama on the road. Those will be huge games for us, especially Vandy at home.
Looking at schedules down the stretch, Vandy plays host to Bama tonight-good for us as one will get another loss. Vandy also still plays us in Athens, has two games left with Kentucky, home game vs Tenn, home game vs. UF. Road games at AU, LSU, and Kentucky. Vandy certainly has an easier schedule than we do, which makes our game vs. them huge for us. Let's assume they lose to us and UK, that gives them 6 conference losses, let's hope that UF and maybe UK can beat them in Nashville OR somehow AU or LSU upsets them at home. I would suspect they SHOULD finish around 9-7 to 8-8 in conference if I were to guess. Let's hope 8-8.
As for Bama, considering they are in the west, they should be able to cruise to a division title at this point, as they have 3 game lead. They have a cake schedule the rest of the way to be honest but that schedule is NOT going to help them with their RPI either. They still have the game at Vandy, they host us of course, and also play at UF and Ole Miss, they have a game at LSU, homes games against Miss, AU and Arkansas. Let's assume they win at LSU, and all home games but us, that gives them 4 more wins for 19 wins and a 11-5 conference mark. If we can get to 9-7 in conference, that would give us 20 wins and should get us in ahead of Bama, although if we lose to them, that might tip the scales in Bama's favor.
If you want to look at UT, since they have the same conference record and already have 9 losses, they have a game at UF coming up Saturday but after that, they can really get on a roll with most games in Knoxville and Pearl is back on sidelines now. They host South Carolina, then us, then travel to Nashville, then host Miss State, then go to SCarolina before hosting UK. Honestly, unless we beat them up there or UK beats them up there, you have to figure they go at worst 9-7 which gets them in.
I think now you can see why those two home losses in conference could REALLY kill us. Now, we have picked up two road conference wins which could help us end up at 8-8, but we really need to get the win at SCarolina on Saturday before we play Vandy next week. We could be 7-4 heading into the back to back UT and UF games which is really where we need to be honestly. We should be able to get the win over LSU and SCarolina at home which would get us to 9 wins, steal either the UT, UF or Bama games and we get to 10-6 which really helps our chances of getting in-in fact I think 10-6 and we are guaranteed a spot. With the way we are playing at the moment though, NOTHING is guaranteed. Winning Saturday and then following that up with the win against Vandy could really do wonders for us folks and if that happens, we could still be in good shape for the dance. Thing is, we KNOW we can beat UT, UF and Vandy, we played all three close games, just got to get over the hump.
We have not heard a thing about possible candidates for our vacant LB or DE position-is that because the job has to be vacant for two weeks?? Seems strange that it has a week now and I have read NOTHING on who might be a candidate. I guess with it following national signing day, it kind of has been lost in the shuffle. I honestly don't know who they might consider but as I have said before, I suspect Grantham will have a lot of input on who ends up being hired. He was heavily involved in hiring Lakatos and Belin last year after he arrived and he is the coordinator. Sounds like Bobo was a big part of the hiring of Will Friend-per Friend Bobo made the first contact with him. This guy MUST be highly thought of (at least in the mind of Mike Bobo) for him to think of this guy immediately after Searels left the program. Hopefully he will be a good hire, sometimes the guys you have not really heard much about end up being the best assistant coaches. We were all THRILLED when Searels was hired but I know personally, I was THRILLED when he left town as well. I also remember when Richt was hired and he hired Brian Van Gorder as his DC, we all were scratching our heads, he turned out to be pretty darn good.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Unfortunately, NIT looking more likely now
I know, it was only one game and I still hold out hope our team can make the NCAA tourney but to be honest, with the way we have played the past couple weeks, I really just don't think our team is good enough to be considered at this point. Xavier was a good team, there is no question about that. But, those are the type games you MUST win at home. Same for the UF and UT games, to be considered an NCAA team, you have to be able to beat the good teams-at least some of the time. We have a victory over Kentucky at this point, but otherwise every good basketball team we have played, we have lost. The good news, we don't have any bad losses to this point and the loss to Xavier is NOT a bad loss. Also good news in that UK beat Tenn last night, which means we are now tied with Kentucky and Tenn for second place in the SECe, two full games behind UF for the division lead. The bad news is we still have games left at UF and UT, along with at Bama and SCarolina. At home, SCarolina, Vandy and LSU. IF we could somehow split the road games and win all three home games, we would sit at 10-6 and 21-9 overall. If that happens, I like our chances a lot. But, I can certainly see this very promising season slipping away here, because of the now three home court losses.
For last night, I didn't think we played bad but just had a lot of trouble scoring in the second half. We could NOT hit any 3's while they did hit some crucial ones-I was surprised they hit as many as they did because coming in they had not been a great 3 point shooting team. We kept Holloway under his average-he got 18 points but some of that was late when we were just simply fouling to save clock. Donte' Jackson was the key man to me, hitting 3 of 4 3's on the night and if you remember, he came in shooting about 29-30% on his 3's for the season although I did hear the announcers say he shot 3's at an over 40% clip last year. For us, Trey had 14 points but had 10 in the first half. A lot of teams now are starting to double, in some cases triple Trey as soon as he touches the ball. He struggles to get rid of the ball when this happens and often times turns it over. We got very little production from the bench, Barnes scored 7 points, but we only played 8 men last night with Thornton and Brantley barely breaking a sweat with getting about 5-6 minutes each. I don't want to second guess Coach Fox too much, but I still don't understand why Connor Nolte does not get more playing time. He might not be as talented as others but the kid just makes plays every time he takes the floor. The 5th foul on Trey was questionable of course but assuming the ref didn't see him get pushed down to the floor, he HAD to call a foul as Trey stood up and the guy tripped on him as he drove to the basket. It was just unfortunate but again, this team just doesn't seem to have that spark to win these games against quality opponents late in the game. We take bad shots or turn the ball over far too many times, last night we struggled all night to stop the drive to the basket-I know Fox loves his man defense but I really think he needs to think about zoning some, his 1-3-1 or 1-2-2 might not be a bad idea especially if he is not going to sub very much.
Now we move on to a game at South Carolina. They host Florida tonight, if they win, they will be tied with us at 5-4. They already beat UF in Gainesville so anything is possible. To say we need to win that game is an understatement. I will take a look at SCarolina later this week but we play them twice in the next couple weeks so a sweep of the Gamecocks certainly would do a lot to improve our chances of making the dance. I am going to post a couple mock tourney's on this post, most likely they will not include our game last night. The loss certainly hurts our chances but not the same as a loss to Auburn would have or a loss to SCarolina will hurt us. Looks like right now we are in, of course this before the game last night, around a 9 or 10 seed.
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/bracketology
http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/bracketology
Back to football for a minute, and the Washaun Ealey story. I listened to radio shows yesterday and today and while some folks think Richt is handling this situation the correct way, many others believe Ealey should be gone. I happen to believe those folks, Ealey should be booted, and right now. I have read too many stories about this kid and his attitude, I think a kid that has already had problems and really ticked off his head coach should not be making any further mistakes. The fact he was in trouble-which forced him to have a punishment run, THEN chooses to skip that punishment, that just tells me this kid is not going to follow the rules and I don't have any further tolerance for kids that don't follow the rules. IF this had been his first offense, ok, maybe I can let him earn his way back. But this was not his first offense and thus, SEE YA Mr. Ealey. Now, Richt is in a tight spot here because he knows he must win in 2011 or he will lose his job. Granted we signed possibly the top RB prospect in America a few days ago but let's not kid ourselves, he is still just that, a PROSPECT. We have no idea how good he will actually be in college we can just speculate. At least with Ealey you know what you got, a decent but not spectacular SEC RB. Now, we also have Caleb King and assuming he will be eligible for the 2011 season, that provides you with experience. Carlton Thomas, well, I have said before and will say again that CT is just not an SEC level tailback. He can do some things in certain situations but that is it. We do have Ken Malcome that the coaches seem to be very excited about and obviously a lot of eyes will be focused on him this spring. But, considering we have two big, REALLY BIG, games to start the 2011 season, I am sure Richt really does not want to kick Ealey off the team. I just think he should personally and I even read yestereday on the message boards that word around Ga Southern is that Ealey will transfer there soon. That would be interesting since we play Southern in 2012 when Ealey of course would be a senior. We shall see what happens with this Ealey mess but as far as I am concerned he should be gone. We have had enough problems with discipline and I think Richt showing him the door would send the proper message. Besides, I have also read/heard that Ealey is not viewed as the most popular guy on the team anyway.
For last night, I didn't think we played bad but just had a lot of trouble scoring in the second half. We could NOT hit any 3's while they did hit some crucial ones-I was surprised they hit as many as they did because coming in they had not been a great 3 point shooting team. We kept Holloway under his average-he got 18 points but some of that was late when we were just simply fouling to save clock. Donte' Jackson was the key man to me, hitting 3 of 4 3's on the night and if you remember, he came in shooting about 29-30% on his 3's for the season although I did hear the announcers say he shot 3's at an over 40% clip last year. For us, Trey had 14 points but had 10 in the first half. A lot of teams now are starting to double, in some cases triple Trey as soon as he touches the ball. He struggles to get rid of the ball when this happens and often times turns it over. We got very little production from the bench, Barnes scored 7 points, but we only played 8 men last night with Thornton and Brantley barely breaking a sweat with getting about 5-6 minutes each. I don't want to second guess Coach Fox too much, but I still don't understand why Connor Nolte does not get more playing time. He might not be as talented as others but the kid just makes plays every time he takes the floor. The 5th foul on Trey was questionable of course but assuming the ref didn't see him get pushed down to the floor, he HAD to call a foul as Trey stood up and the guy tripped on him as he drove to the basket. It was just unfortunate but again, this team just doesn't seem to have that spark to win these games against quality opponents late in the game. We take bad shots or turn the ball over far too many times, last night we struggled all night to stop the drive to the basket-I know Fox loves his man defense but I really think he needs to think about zoning some, his 1-3-1 or 1-2-2 might not be a bad idea especially if he is not going to sub very much.
Now we move on to a game at South Carolina. They host Florida tonight, if they win, they will be tied with us at 5-4. They already beat UF in Gainesville so anything is possible. To say we need to win that game is an understatement. I will take a look at SCarolina later this week but we play them twice in the next couple weeks so a sweep of the Gamecocks certainly would do a lot to improve our chances of making the dance. I am going to post a couple mock tourney's on this post, most likely they will not include our game last night. The loss certainly hurts our chances but not the same as a loss to Auburn would have or a loss to SCarolina will hurt us. Looks like right now we are in, of course this before the game last night, around a 9 or 10 seed.
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/bracketology
http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/bracketology
Back to football for a minute, and the Washaun Ealey story. I listened to radio shows yesterday and today and while some folks think Richt is handling this situation the correct way, many others believe Ealey should be gone. I happen to believe those folks, Ealey should be booted, and right now. I have read too many stories about this kid and his attitude, I think a kid that has already had problems and really ticked off his head coach should not be making any further mistakes. The fact he was in trouble-which forced him to have a punishment run, THEN chooses to skip that punishment, that just tells me this kid is not going to follow the rules and I don't have any further tolerance for kids that don't follow the rules. IF this had been his first offense, ok, maybe I can let him earn his way back. But this was not his first offense and thus, SEE YA Mr. Ealey. Now, Richt is in a tight spot here because he knows he must win in 2011 or he will lose his job. Granted we signed possibly the top RB prospect in America a few days ago but let's not kid ourselves, he is still just that, a PROSPECT. We have no idea how good he will actually be in college we can just speculate. At least with Ealey you know what you got, a decent but not spectacular SEC RB. Now, we also have Caleb King and assuming he will be eligible for the 2011 season, that provides you with experience. Carlton Thomas, well, I have said before and will say again that CT is just not an SEC level tailback. He can do some things in certain situations but that is it. We do have Ken Malcome that the coaches seem to be very excited about and obviously a lot of eyes will be focused on him this spring. But, considering we have two big, REALLY BIG, games to start the 2011 season, I am sure Richt really does not want to kick Ealey off the team. I just think he should personally and I even read yestereday on the message boards that word around Ga Southern is that Ealey will transfer there soon. That would be interesting since we play Southern in 2012 when Ealey of course would be a senior. We shall see what happens with this Ealey mess but as far as I am concerned he should be gone. We have had enough problems with discipline and I think Richt showing him the door would send the proper message. Besides, I have also read/heard that Ealey is not viewed as the most popular guy on the team anyway.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
New OL coach, HUGE hoops game tonight
*************UPDATE*****************************************************************
Washaun Ealey has been indefinately suspended from all football related activities, per Ealey and SID Claude Felton, Coach Richt should make a statement later today. Evidently, this is due to Ealey missing a punishment run or something along those lines. Ealey is still in school, still hopes to remain but is also exploring his options. I think the fact he has already had issues last year off the field, he is lucky to still be part of the team. I have heard that he has attitude issues and of course last spring I witnessed first hand him talking trash/starting fights in the G-day game. I am not ready to say get rid of him but I think if you look at this situation, coupled with Caleb King's academic issues, it becomes pretty easy to see why Coach Richt last week said, he would not be surprised if Isiah Crowell was starting in week 1. I think that is certainly the plan as it stands right now and quite honestly, I think Crowell is the best back on our team right now despite the fact he does not even attend UGA yet. Still, I personally would like to have EITHER King or Ealey around for next fall, Crowell has shown that he can play with injuries but he has shown he gets injured quite often as well. It would be nice to have someone experienced back there with him for depth reasons. Malcome might be a really good player but he has the same game experience as does Crowell, NONE. Still, this spring Malcome is someone to keep an eye on. Also, we have Carlton Thomas but again, I am just not sold on him being an SEC RB. He tries hard and seems to be a good young man but that doesn't help us win football games.
*************************************************************************************
First of all, let's say welcome back to UGA Will Friend. Sounds to me like a pretty decent hire as though he is from UAB, he did play college football at Bama, his Dad is longtime coach, he has worked in Athens before so not like he is a total stranger-bottom line I just don't know much about him except he is bald, a bit overweight it appears, and comes with a strong endorsement of Neil Callaway who Richt hired as our original OL coach back in 2001. Here is the Will Friend Bio-
http://uabsports.cstv.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/friend_will00.html
Now the attention will turn to replacing Warren Belin-a LB coach or maybe not. The job posting is for a defensive end coach so who really knows what is going on. Considering we only have 3 down lineman on our 3-4 D, two of those positions are considered defensive end?? Is Rodney Garner going to coach the nose tackles only??? Time will tell, but I imagine they are looking for the best possible coach and will adjust roles accordingly when they hire the new coach. As with the OL coaching hire, I might not be aware of the candidates they are looking at and might not really outwardly strongly approve of the hire BUT I respect that Mark Richt knows what he is doing. In the case of the D coach, I feel like it will be Richt AND Grantham calling the shots there so whomever those guys believe is the best guy for the spot, we just have to trust their judgement and wait to see how it all pans out.
Big game tonight inside Stegman. Xavier, out of the Atlantic 10 conference, pays a visit. This game could REALLY benefit our hoops team because the X is a very nationally recognized program. They have been to three straight sweet 16's, made the dance I believe I read 9 out of the last 10 years. They have an RPI of 24, while ours is 36. Point blank, this game tonight provides our team an opportunity to beat a very quality opponent which would be a feather in our cap come selection Sunday. I just hope our guys come ready to play because I know we will get the best of Xavier. This is a basketball school, a school that is used to winning big games, a team that has veteran players. Lets take a look at the Musketeers now (wow, that is a bad nickname I have to say).
First of all, as I mentioned yesterday, same overall record as us, 16-6, but they are 8-1 in their conference. They are in the same conference as Temple, a team that beat us earlier in Orlando. Xavier beat Temple by 11 this year. As for their wins on the season, they have wins over Iowa, Butler, Wake, UMASS, Rhode Island, Richmond, Dayton-I mention some of those smaller schools just because those schools have been NCAA tourney teams many years before. Losses so far, Old Dominion in a preseason tourney, at Miami of Ohio, at Gonzaga, home against UF, at Cincy, and then the only conference loss at Charlotte-hey, this team has a losing record but they are not a horrible team. If you look at their schedule, certainly not a murderers row but still, respectable enough and of course this is a team that goes to the big tourament every year. This is a big game for them just as it is for us.
Looking at there starting lineup, this is a veteran team, starting two Juniors, two seniors, and one soph. They do NOT play many guys off the bench, much like Kentucky. IF we can get one or two of their guys in foul trouble, HUGE advantage for us. Course, same goes for them against us, but we do have some guys on our bench that play some minutes. Without question they bring a VERY talented guard to Athens in junior Tu Holloway, the kid is averaging 20.8 pts a game, which leads the Atlantic 10. He was just named NATIONAL player of the week for his two games last week. He also averages 5 assists per game and shoots nearly 87% from the FT line. Stopping him will be a big key to winning this game, or should I say trying to slow him down. He is only 6'0" so not like he has a height advantage over our small guards. The next guy up is Mark Lyons, the only soph starter, who is a 6'1" guard averaging 13.8pts a game, almost 4 assists a game. Next is junior center, Kenny Frease, a 7'0" player averaging 11.9 pts and 6.8 rebounds a game. This is a big guy, not only tall but tips the scales at 270lbs, this will be a tough matchup for Trey, Price or Barnes. Next are the two forwards, first is senior Jamel McLean who at 6'8" averages 11.4 pts and leads them in rebounding at 8.8 boards a game. Other forward is senior Dante' Jackson, 6'5" averaging 7.6pts and 3 rebounds a game.
Looking at minutes played, all 5 starters average 28 or more minutes a game. They have one reserve, Jeff Robinson, that averages double digit minutes off the bench, he averages 4pts a game and 3 boards, getting about 17 minutes a contest. Other than that, really no others that make much of an impact off their bench in any statistical category. FT shooting, Holloway is by far the best, Jackson is at 77%, Lyons at 73 but the other two are low to mid 60's. As for three point shooting, that is really not a strength or so it appears looking at the percentages. Holloway only shoots 34.7% while Lyons shoots a little better at 38.9%. Jackson has attempted most 3's but has a bad percentage at 29%. One interesting stat about the 7 footer, he has only attempted 61 FT's on the year-so it appears to me the offense clearly flows through Holloway.
The key to this game will be our ability to continue our great work rebounding but also we must have our guards avoid foul trouble and turnovers. The last few games, especially Gerald Robinson, has been quickly picking up fouls and also turned the ball over quite often. Considering we are playing a team with two very quality guards, it will be very important that our guards play well-we lose a lot when we have to sub out our two starting guards, although I must admit Brantley is playing much better both offensively and defensively. Our bigs will have their hands full as this team has some size to it, with McLean and Frease, but we need Trey back to 100% in the middle. Also, we need Jeremy Price to continue to be an offensive force, that just gives us one more offensive element to go along with Trey, Travis and Gerald. This is a game that we certainly can win, Xavier is a good solid team but if we play up to our ability, we can and will beat them at home. Their AD is coming down for the game, he sits on the NCAA tournament board, this game could go a long way to getting us in the dance even if we finish with an 8-8 SEC mark. We need to prove to folks we can beat quality opponents, other than Kentucky, we have struggled to beat the quality opponents. Course, we have avoided bad losses which is great but quality wins would really help our cause. Game tonight is set for 7pm on ESPNU.
Washaun Ealey has been indefinately suspended from all football related activities, per Ealey and SID Claude Felton, Coach Richt should make a statement later today. Evidently, this is due to Ealey missing a punishment run or something along those lines. Ealey is still in school, still hopes to remain but is also exploring his options. I think the fact he has already had issues last year off the field, he is lucky to still be part of the team. I have heard that he has attitude issues and of course last spring I witnessed first hand him talking trash/starting fights in the G-day game. I am not ready to say get rid of him but I think if you look at this situation, coupled with Caleb King's academic issues, it becomes pretty easy to see why Coach Richt last week said, he would not be surprised if Isiah Crowell was starting in week 1. I think that is certainly the plan as it stands right now and quite honestly, I think Crowell is the best back on our team right now despite the fact he does not even attend UGA yet. Still, I personally would like to have EITHER King or Ealey around for next fall, Crowell has shown that he can play with injuries but he has shown he gets injured quite often as well. It would be nice to have someone experienced back there with him for depth reasons. Malcome might be a really good player but he has the same game experience as does Crowell, NONE. Still, this spring Malcome is someone to keep an eye on. Also, we have Carlton Thomas but again, I am just not sold on him being an SEC RB. He tries hard and seems to be a good young man but that doesn't help us win football games.
*************************************************************************************
First of all, let's say welcome back to UGA Will Friend. Sounds to me like a pretty decent hire as though he is from UAB, he did play college football at Bama, his Dad is longtime coach, he has worked in Athens before so not like he is a total stranger-bottom line I just don't know much about him except he is bald, a bit overweight it appears, and comes with a strong endorsement of Neil Callaway who Richt hired as our original OL coach back in 2001. Here is the Will Friend Bio-
http://uabsports.cstv.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/friend_will00.html
Now the attention will turn to replacing Warren Belin-a LB coach or maybe not. The job posting is for a defensive end coach so who really knows what is going on. Considering we only have 3 down lineman on our 3-4 D, two of those positions are considered defensive end?? Is Rodney Garner going to coach the nose tackles only??? Time will tell, but I imagine they are looking for the best possible coach and will adjust roles accordingly when they hire the new coach. As with the OL coaching hire, I might not be aware of the candidates they are looking at and might not really outwardly strongly approve of the hire BUT I respect that Mark Richt knows what he is doing. In the case of the D coach, I feel like it will be Richt AND Grantham calling the shots there so whomever those guys believe is the best guy for the spot, we just have to trust their judgement and wait to see how it all pans out.
Big game tonight inside Stegman. Xavier, out of the Atlantic 10 conference, pays a visit. This game could REALLY benefit our hoops team because the X is a very nationally recognized program. They have been to three straight sweet 16's, made the dance I believe I read 9 out of the last 10 years. They have an RPI of 24, while ours is 36. Point blank, this game tonight provides our team an opportunity to beat a very quality opponent which would be a feather in our cap come selection Sunday. I just hope our guys come ready to play because I know we will get the best of Xavier. This is a basketball school, a school that is used to winning big games, a team that has veteran players. Lets take a look at the Musketeers now (wow, that is a bad nickname I have to say).
First of all, as I mentioned yesterday, same overall record as us, 16-6, but they are 8-1 in their conference. They are in the same conference as Temple, a team that beat us earlier in Orlando. Xavier beat Temple by 11 this year. As for their wins on the season, they have wins over Iowa, Butler, Wake, UMASS, Rhode Island, Richmond, Dayton-I mention some of those smaller schools just because those schools have been NCAA tourney teams many years before. Losses so far, Old Dominion in a preseason tourney, at Miami of Ohio, at Gonzaga, home against UF, at Cincy, and then the only conference loss at Charlotte-hey, this team has a losing record but they are not a horrible team. If you look at their schedule, certainly not a murderers row but still, respectable enough and of course this is a team that goes to the big tourament every year. This is a big game for them just as it is for us.
Looking at there starting lineup, this is a veteran team, starting two Juniors, two seniors, and one soph. They do NOT play many guys off the bench, much like Kentucky. IF we can get one or two of their guys in foul trouble, HUGE advantage for us. Course, same goes for them against us, but we do have some guys on our bench that play some minutes. Without question they bring a VERY talented guard to Athens in junior Tu Holloway, the kid is averaging 20.8 pts a game, which leads the Atlantic 10. He was just named NATIONAL player of the week for his two games last week. He also averages 5 assists per game and shoots nearly 87% from the FT line. Stopping him will be a big key to winning this game, or should I say trying to slow him down. He is only 6'0" so not like he has a height advantage over our small guards. The next guy up is Mark Lyons, the only soph starter, who is a 6'1" guard averaging 13.8pts a game, almost 4 assists a game. Next is junior center, Kenny Frease, a 7'0" player averaging 11.9 pts and 6.8 rebounds a game. This is a big guy, not only tall but tips the scales at 270lbs, this will be a tough matchup for Trey, Price or Barnes. Next are the two forwards, first is senior Jamel McLean who at 6'8" averages 11.4 pts and leads them in rebounding at 8.8 boards a game. Other forward is senior Dante' Jackson, 6'5" averaging 7.6pts and 3 rebounds a game.
Looking at minutes played, all 5 starters average 28 or more minutes a game. They have one reserve, Jeff Robinson, that averages double digit minutes off the bench, he averages 4pts a game and 3 boards, getting about 17 minutes a contest. Other than that, really no others that make much of an impact off their bench in any statistical category. FT shooting, Holloway is by far the best, Jackson is at 77%, Lyons at 73 but the other two are low to mid 60's. As for three point shooting, that is really not a strength or so it appears looking at the percentages. Holloway only shoots 34.7% while Lyons shoots a little better at 38.9%. Jackson has attempted most 3's but has a bad percentage at 29%. One interesting stat about the 7 footer, he has only attempted 61 FT's on the year-so it appears to me the offense clearly flows through Holloway.
The key to this game will be our ability to continue our great work rebounding but also we must have our guards avoid foul trouble and turnovers. The last few games, especially Gerald Robinson, has been quickly picking up fouls and also turned the ball over quite often. Considering we are playing a team with two very quality guards, it will be very important that our guards play well-we lose a lot when we have to sub out our two starting guards, although I must admit Brantley is playing much better both offensively and defensively. Our bigs will have their hands full as this team has some size to it, with McLean and Frease, but we need Trey back to 100% in the middle. Also, we need Jeremy Price to continue to be an offensive force, that just gives us one more offensive element to go along with Trey, Travis and Gerald. This is a game that we certainly can win, Xavier is a good solid team but if we play up to our ability, we can and will beat them at home. Their AD is coming down for the game, he sits on the NCAA tournament board, this game could go a long way to getting us in the dance even if we finish with an 8-8 SEC mark. We need to prove to folks we can beat quality opponents, other than Kentucky, we have struggled to beat the quality opponents. Course, we have avoided bad losses which is great but quality wins would really help our cause. Game tonight is set for 7pm on ESPNU.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Ok, here is my depth chart guess
I noticed Seth Emerson had his best guess depth chart on his blog, and since I consider his blog the best around, I figured I would give you all my take on the early depth chart, first offense, the new recruiting class will be listed and * means headed for RS year in my opinion. Of course there are some of the RS players I might forget as well-there are a lot of players to take under consideration.
QB
Aaron Murray
Hutson Mason
*Christian LeMay-if Murray gets hurt, LeMay moves into a strong fight for #1 role.
FB
Bruce Figgins
Zander Ogletree
TB
Isiah Crowell/Washuan Ealey-I think this is Crowell's job to lose and I wouldn't be surprised if the coaches didn't promise him to start in game 1.
Ken Malcome
Caleb King-he likely moves ahead of Malcome if eligible but not 100% sure he is at the moment.
Carlton Thomas.
WR
Tavarres King
Michael Bennett
Chris Conley/Malcome Mitchell
*Sanford Seay
WR
Marlon Brown
Rantavious Wooten
Israel Troupe
Conley/Mitchell
*Justin Scott-Wesley
TE
Orson Charles
Aron White
Arthur Lynch
*Jay Rome
OT
Trinton Sturdivant
AJ Harmon
Brent Benedict
*Watts Dantzler
OG
Cordy Glenn
Dallas Lee
Kolton Houston
Austin Long
C
Ben Jones
Chris Burnette
*David Andrews
OG
Bean Anderson
Dallas Lee
Kolton Houston
Austin Long
*Hunter Long
OT
Kenarious Gates
AJ Harmon/Benedict
*Zach Debell
*Xzavier Ward
K
Blair Walsh
Brandon Bogotay
P
Drew Butler
Snapper
Ty Frix
*Nathan Theus
Defense
DE
DeAngelo Tyson
Derrick Lott
*Sterling Bailey
NT
John Jenkins
Kwame Geathers
Mike Thornton
*Chris Mayes
DE
Abry Jones
Garrison Smith
Brandon Burrows
OLB
Cornelius Washington
Ray Drew
TJ Stripling
OLB
Jarvis Jones
Reuben Faloughi
Dexter Morant
ILB
Christian Robinson
Kent Turene
Ramik Wilson
ILB
Richard Samuel
Mike Gilliard
Amarlo Herrera
CB
Brandon Boykin
Jordan Love
Damian Swann
*Nick Marshall-he could play as well, just thinking a corner will likely redshirt, plus I want him to play hoops
CB
Sanders Commings
Branden Smith
Derek Owens
*Devin Bowman
FS
Alec Ogletree
Shawn Williams
Marc Deas
SS
Baccari Rambo
Jakar Hamilton
Corey Moore
*Chris Sanders
Special teams-Q. Harrow likely plays as a FR. I think that takes into account all the FR, so I have 15 potential redshirts if my count is right, with 11 likely to play this fall. That sounds about right to me.
Tomorrow I will preview Xavier but I can tell you, they have the same overall record as we do, 16-6, conference record they are 8-1. They have played three opponents we have played, record 2-1 while our record is 1-2. Temple, Saint Louis and Florida being those three schools. They are a very experience/veteran team but like several other schools we have played, they really don't play their bench much at all. So, foul trouble can and will play a factor in this game for both sides really.
QB
Aaron Murray
Hutson Mason
*Christian LeMay-if Murray gets hurt, LeMay moves into a strong fight for #1 role.
FB
Bruce Figgins
Zander Ogletree
TB
Isiah Crowell/Washuan Ealey-I think this is Crowell's job to lose and I wouldn't be surprised if the coaches didn't promise him to start in game 1.
Ken Malcome
Caleb King-he likely moves ahead of Malcome if eligible but not 100% sure he is at the moment.
Carlton Thomas.
WR
Tavarres King
Michael Bennett
Chris Conley/Malcome Mitchell
*Sanford Seay
WR
Marlon Brown
Rantavious Wooten
Israel Troupe
Conley/Mitchell
*Justin Scott-Wesley
TE
Orson Charles
Aron White
Arthur Lynch
*Jay Rome
OT
Trinton Sturdivant
AJ Harmon
Brent Benedict
*Watts Dantzler
OG
Cordy Glenn
Dallas Lee
Kolton Houston
Austin Long
C
Ben Jones
Chris Burnette
*David Andrews
OG
Bean Anderson
Dallas Lee
Kolton Houston
Austin Long
*Hunter Long
OT
Kenarious Gates
AJ Harmon/Benedict
*Zach Debell
*Xzavier Ward
K
Blair Walsh
Brandon Bogotay
P
Drew Butler
Snapper
Ty Frix
*Nathan Theus
Defense
DE
DeAngelo Tyson
Derrick Lott
*Sterling Bailey
NT
John Jenkins
Kwame Geathers
Mike Thornton
*Chris Mayes
DE
Abry Jones
Garrison Smith
Brandon Burrows
OLB
Cornelius Washington
Ray Drew
TJ Stripling
OLB
Jarvis Jones
Reuben Faloughi
Dexter Morant
ILB
Christian Robinson
Kent Turene
Ramik Wilson
ILB
Richard Samuel
Mike Gilliard
Amarlo Herrera
CB
Brandon Boykin
Jordan Love
Damian Swann
*Nick Marshall-he could play as well, just thinking a corner will likely redshirt, plus I want him to play hoops
CB
Sanders Commings
Branden Smith
Derek Owens
*Devin Bowman
FS
Alec Ogletree
Shawn Williams
Marc Deas
SS
Baccari Rambo
Jakar Hamilton
Corey Moore
*Chris Sanders
Special teams-Q. Harrow likely plays as a FR. I think that takes into account all the FR, so I have 15 potential redshirts if my count is right, with 11 likely to play this fall. That sounds about right to me.
Tomorrow I will preview Xavier but I can tell you, they have the same overall record as we do, 16-6, conference record they are 8-1. They have played three opponents we have played, record 2-1 while our record is 1-2. Temple, Saint Louis and Florida being those three schools. They are a very experience/veteran team but like several other schools we have played, they really don't play their bench much at all. So, foul trouble can and will play a factor in this game for both sides really.
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