First, you must admit, an ugly win is ALWAYS better than a pretty loss. Yes, we SHOULD have handled AU much easier today but the fact remains, we got the win and we move on. Next up is a date with non conference Xavier on Tuesday night, 7pm in the Steg. Obviously that will be a big game for us because Xavier is a yearly participant in the NCAA tourney, their AD is on the tournament board and will be attending the game. This is a team that will give us all we can handle and more, I will preview them Monday or Tuesday. Back to today, AU played very well and we played so so, except for a GREAT day for Jeremy Price and also Travis Leslie. Those two guys helped pick up the slack for Trey, Dustin and especially Gerald. Our guards really struggled today, neither scored until late in the second half and all day were beat on the defensive end by the AU guards, they couldn't defend the dribble drive all day. Course you now hear that Trey and several others on the team has flu like symptoms before the game, Trey even had an IV before he could play. Wish I had known that before the game so I maybe would have expected the type game we witnessed. Price, I have been critical of him at times this year but the kid came to play today, he grabbed double digit rebounds, scored 22 points, he hit 9 or 11 FT's, very impressive. Travis also, with 20 points finally had a solid game after disappearing for our last two road games. Trey chipped in what was a very quiet 16, unless I looked at the box, I would have never known he had that many points. Earnest Ross was on fire for AU, finishing with 30 points. Now, we had a huge rebounding advantage, a huge FT advantage, were playing at home and had more talent-what could possibly cause this game to end up going to OT-TURNOVERS. Yep, that ugly word we always talk about in football, that was a huge factor in the game today, none bigger than when Trey had a horrible inbounds pass which AU used to tie the game and send it to OT. Turnovers have been a problem for us now for the past 3-4 games, we have got to get those cleaned up. Early in the year it was missing FT's, or being outrebounded, now it is turnovers. You get the feeling that at some point, when/if we put it all together, this team can be a really dangerous team. Hopefully they will pick up soon, because we have a tough slate coming up and we need to win some games and boost our chances for the NCAA tourney. A loss today might have eliminated us from the dance, barring a win of the SEC tournament, that is how HUGE it was that we pulled this win out. AU was rated our worst opponent of the year except for Manhattan, a loss to them would have hit our RPI so badly, considering we are likely to lose a few more down the stretch, it is unlikely we could come back from the hit. Thankfully though we did just enough and now set up a game that can really help our chances playing a quality non conference opponent in February-very rare to play a game like this in the middle of conference play. It could end up being a genius move my Coach Fox but even a loss doesn't kill us because the X is such a quality and respected opponent.
Cherry on top is how Coach Richt described John Jenkins selecting UGA over UF today at his high school in Conn. As I have said before and will say again, this kid to me is every bit as important for our D as Crowell was for our offense. Being able to plug a guy that is 6'4" and 350 into the middle of your DL, it frees up your DT's and LB's to make a lot of plays, frees them up to go hard after the QB, it also might very well signal a move of Bean Anderson back to the OL which gives the OL another proven OT, with us having Sturdivant, Glenn, Gates and Jones back. If Anderson stays on D, perhaps a kid like Geathers could move to OT, considering his enormous size-height of 6'7". Jenkins comments about wanting to get his degree, wanting to play ball for Coach Richt, just makes you feel good about him selecting our school. Let's just hope he stays healthy and makes as big an impact as I predict he will make. So now the 2011 class is complete with 26 kids signed. 2 count towards last year, which means we only signed 24 and that is within the 25 limit. There is a chance that a least one signee will end up in prep or JUCO so I would think our walkon guys likely will be able to keep their spots for another year-we shall see how that all plays out. All in all you have to say today, other than the sad news about UGA from yesterday and he being laid to rest today RIP UGA VIII, was a good day for the red and black.
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