Another solid win for the men’s basketball team on Saturday. Vandy wasn’t so much a game that Georgia should expect to win as it was a solid measuring stick for where Georgia might expect to finish in the SEC East. Vandy has noteworthy wins over Tennessee and Georgia Tech, so they presented some solid competition. While the South Carolina game was a test to see how Georgia could come off a losing slide and handle a team they were supposed to beat, the Vandy game tested their ability to sustain a level of play and hold the home court against a relative conference peer. They passed.

While Mike Mercer struggled a bit, it was good to see some other names step up. Bliss was impressive. Stukes was clutch. And once again, Gaines was the glue. Though Gaines didn’t break double-figures, his seven assists and five rebounds were critical. One really nice development was a solid game by Billy Humphrey. Over the past year, opponents had figured out ways to deny Humphrey from setting up shop in a comfortable spot on the perimeter. On Saturday he found ways to get open and even got around the basket some.

Though there were and always are several other individual contributions that matter in wins like this, it’s becoming axiomatic that Georgia will be in most every game where two guards plus Gaines play well. It might be Stukes or Mercer or in this case Stukes and Humphrey, but multiple threats at the guard spot with Gaines orchestrating things is a (and probably the) recipe for success for this team. Though I don’t mean to discount the work Bliss and Singleton have done to become better, it’s no secret that it’s a lot easier for the inside game to make its contribution when defenders are drawn to the perimeter.

As we’ve seen a couple of times this year, we know that this guard play won’t happen every time out, and the frontcourt isn’t to the point yet where they can carry the team. It was still good to see that kind of production in a big conference game against divisional foes. With return trips to Nashville and Columbia still to come, it might be premature to pencil Georgia in as the #4 team in the SEC East, but they’ve done their part so far to make that progress.

It was a much more disappointing story for the women. Losing to Tennessee isn’t necessarily something to fret over; they beat a lot of good teams. But the way in which they lost to Tennessee was the troubling and disappointing part. The upperclassmen simply did not respond to the challenge. Chambers didn’t hit a shot from the floor. Hardrick had a single basket. Humphrey managed just eight points. While freshmen are counted on to be a large part of this year’s team, the juniors and seniors are the ones with all-conference honors who are supposed to lead the way in games like these. They didn’t.

The result was the lowest-scoring output by an Andy Landers Georgia team. In their four losses this year, the Lady Dogs have scored 62, 54, 55, and 41 points. Yes, those losses were to four good opponents, but they found ways to bottle up a Georgia offense used to scoring 70-80 points. Georgia needs to find a source for offense against quality opponents, and they don’t have very long to search. The next three opponents are all quality teams – Vanderbilt, FSU, and Ole Miss.

I’m not a fan of the Steelers or Dolphins. If I were, I’d probably be staring cross-eyed at the newspaper wondering why Chan Gailey is still a candidate for either head coaching position.

Is Gailey a bad coach? No. He’s had at least some degree of success in most of his positions in the same sense that Hyundai is a "successful" car brand. Sure, it isn’t Toyota or Honda or even Ford, but it isn’t Yugo either. Such has been Gailey’s career. Rarely awful, never spectacular. There was a divisional title with the Cowboys and two playoff appearances. He has maintained Georgia Tech’s consecutive bowl streak while winning an ACC divisional title this past year. He isn’t known for any specific innovation or approach to the game; he’s just the beige of coaches.

Is that really what Pittsburgh and Miami are after? Jeez – Pittsburgh. Not even a season removed from a Super Bowl title, and they are considering a man who lost his only two NFL playoff appearances. Can you replace the dominant personality of Cowher with the relatively anonymous Gailey?

Miami is even more puzzling. They went out a few years ago and hired a flashy coach, proven as much as one can be at the college level, and still couldn’t get the ship righted in two seasons. They’re desperate. Read this quote from owner Wayne Huizenga and tell me you don’t see the desperation.

"There’s only one thing I want to do, and it’s win," Huizenga said. "I don’t care what it takes, what it costs, what’s involved, we’re going to make this a winning franchise. It’s no fun owning a team if you’re not winning, I can tell you that. And we are absolutely, positively going to get back to being a winning team. And sooner rather than later."

I’ve tried, but I can’t reconcile that statement with the fact that Gailey has had a second interview with Miami. Huizenga’s whatever-it-takes and whatever-it-costs mission to win is focusing in on a guy who has lost at least five games a season at Georgia Tech?

I don’t have anything personal against Gailey, and I don’t blame him for looking to move on. The Tech faithful aren’t especially taken with him, and it can’t be fun trying to babysit guys like Reggie Ball in the Tech academic jungle. I don’t question at all why Gailey would be interested in the head coaching positions of these two proud NFL franchises. I just question why they would be interested in him and his sure fate of 9-7 seasons. Other than the ties to those organizations in his past, what am I missing?

Update: I’m obviously not the only one scratching my head over this.

Marquis “Mudcat” Elmore has always been a bit of a strange story. He was a blue-chip recruit, bounced from linebacker to defensive end to defensive tackle, and has endured several injuries throughout his career at Georgia. He was never able to contribute much, and for that reason many put the “bust” label on him and he became a punchline of sorts as fans wondered when he might break through and live up to his billing.

Steve Patterson has a good story up ($) on UGA’s offseason program, and it includes a few final thoughts from Elmore on his career.

I have no regrets. I had a great time here, and it was the only place I ever wanted to be. I know that I came in ranked highly, but I had to have surgery, and that is just the way my career went. I was not the first, and I am not going to be the last. I am done with football. I am going to get my degree and go to work. I want to be a coach.

After all of that, he didn’t lose focus, and he’s on his way in life. He’s not bitter, doesn’t place blame, and leaves with his head on straight. Even if the Georgia football program didn’t turn him into an NFL star, it sure seems in this case to have produced a man pointed in the right direction.

Georgia led by double-digits at halftime and by as many as 29 points before finishing with an 80-56 win over South Carolina Wednesday night.

One of the best things about the box score was the turnover number. Only 10 turnovers in the game, and only two of those were by guards. That means that Georgia got into their offense and was often able to get a shot off. They didn’t shoot 50%, but they shot more than good enough for the number of possessions they had.

Georgia beating South Carolina isn’t huge news; it was expected. Andy Johnston talks about this today in the ABH. “(The win) broke no ground. It showed us what we already knew. They beat the teams they should beat.”

I see what he’s getting at. Georgia was favored to win comfortably. It would have been much bigger news and a sure sign of trouble had they lost. Still, I think it’s significant that there are major conference teams, even SEC teams, that fit into Georgia’s “teams you should beat” category. After two years of being the team everyone else should beat, that’s some progress. Accuse me of setting my expectations too low at this point, but this is at least something. Even in last year’s season sweep of South Carolina, Georgia was dragged into two of the ugliest games you’ll ever see. Though the ultimate outcome last night was still the same – a win – the style points from taking apart an overmatched SEC foe counts in my book.

Vanderbilt is next, and they’re an enigmatic team that lost to Auburn and Furman but beat Georgia Tech and Tennessee. Are they on Georgia’s small “teams they should beat” list? It’s definitely a chance to go to 2-1 in the conference and a very important opportunity to hold serve at home. You don’t know quite what to expect from Georgia, but if the turnovers remain down I’ll like their chances.

It’s never a good idea to put too much stock into a single basketball game. Last season, we thought a series of early SEC wins would propel Georgia into a sure postseason bid. Then we watched the season tank.

This year, we were flying high after a win over Gonzaga. But then the Dawgs failed to grab any kind of momentum from that win and have now lost four straight.

Tonight’s game with South Carolina isn’t a must-win in the sense that a single loss can always be overcome at some point. It also isn’t a potential cure-all; Georgia has a long ways to go in the SEC schedule. But as much as a single game at this stage of the season can be a must-win, this is it.

South Carolina has looked pretty dreadful in the few games they’ve played against decent competition, and Georgia is heavily-favored. This game isn’t a sure win by any stretch, as Georgia is not yet to the point of taking any opponent for granted. After coming up short against four good opponents, the Dawgs sorely need a win, and playing a struggling South Carolina team in Stegeman Coliseum is the kind of game Georgia must win if they hope to right the ship and make any kind of noise in the SEC.

Conference validation

For the life of me, I can’t understand the SEC’s constant need for validation. Honestly I think it’s just something that’s woven into the fabric of the South as the region deals with stereotypes. Everyone knows that good football is played in the South, but we have to go to any lengths to prove that the SEC is the best. It’s all that "Yankee media bias" we have to overcome. SEC fans are so fanatical about our football that we’ve collectively developed this provincial and paranoid insecurity that requires us to be reassured constantly that the SEC is tops.

So it’s no surprise that SEC fans, and of course I’m mostly talking about the Georgia fans I hear from, are doing their best to ride Florida’s coattails. Great. Let’s print up a batch of SEC #1 t-shirts and measure the players for their SEC Rules rings.

I said back during the bowls that I don’t really buy into the conference loyalty thing. I don’t see how having the reigning national champion next door is a good thing, especially as recruiting hits the home stretch. Florida on top just makes our job that much more difficult, though not impossible – remember what happened the last time Georgia faced a Florida team holding the title. Nor do I use the bowls as conference barometers. If we do, how can we place so much importance on Florida beating Ohio State while ignoring an unranked Penn State making Tennessee look ugly or Wisconsin having no problems with Arkansas?

Of course I’m not trying to put down the SEC. I have no problem defending the football played here. We just go overboard sometimes (OK, often). If last night’s win is a fundamental statement by the SEC, what was it last year when the SEC champion fell behind 28-0 to a team from the Big East? I guess I just put a lot more value in matchups than geography.

The win much more than anything else just means that Florida was better and more prepared than Ohio State. It’s amusing that every SEC team on Florida’s schedule came closer to Florida than Ohio State did, but that doesn’t make the Buckeyes on par with Vanderbilt. Those extrapolating that Ohio State would be an 8-4 SEC team (and I’ve seen that very line) are reading way too much into a single game. The Buckeye defense looked lost against the spread offense, and Ohio State presented nothing unique and challenging for the Florida defense. Florida improved a great deal in their final two games; the same team that struggled to score and beat South Carolina and FSU in November got it together in time for the postseason.

Give Florida credit, and maybe the rest of the conference can try to knock Florida off instead of letting them carry the water for the rest of us.

BCS validation

We’ve also started to hear how this outcome validates the matchup set up by the BCS. That’s fine; these were two of the top teams and I have no problem with either in the title game. But I can’t help thinking how close we came to not having this matchup and about the sequence of events that had to happen in order to bring about this outcome:

• Florida had to block several South Carolina kicks to avoid their second loss.
• SoCal losing an improbable finale to UCLA.
• Louisville being offsides on a field goal attempt.
• Poll voters explicitly engineering around a tOSU – Michigan rematch.

Again, I’m not knocking Florida’s title. They earned it, and of such breaks and plays are champions made in all sports. But events independent of Florida’s control nearly kept them from even having a shot at the title. Would a playoff be any better? You’re still not guaranteed that the "best" teams will play for the title, but you are at least more certain that qualified teams will have the opportunity to play in the process. We’ve seen before (2004) that the regular-season-is-your-playoff line can be pretty flimsy. We’ve also learned a bit about how hard it is to be objective when determining the two best teams. Two months ago, the "Hype Lives Here" machine of ABCESPN, complete with countdown clock, had a lot of us thinking that Michigan and Ohio State were #1 and #2. Both proved to be paper tigers in their bowls. With Florida on top, we’re still left with a question we had two months ago: who’s #2?

On that note, we also need to look sometime at how we use losses as strikes against title contenders. Of course a five-loss team doesn’t belong in the discussion, but I think it says something that a couple of two-loss teams turned in two of the most impressive BCS performances. Even given their losses, I’d have trouble picking against SoCal or LSU versus any team.

Aside – can we shut up about 2004 now?

One of the biggest chips on the shoulders of SEC fans recently was the "snub" of Auburn in the 2004 national title game. In our insecure little province, that event was a sign that the media and the rest of the nation didn’t respect the SEC. Oklahoma and SoCal started the season #1 and #2. Without a loss, there is no way that any other team was going to jump them. Yet some still maintain that an Auburn team who came into 2004 off an 8-5 season and a generous #10 preseason ranking should have been in the title game instead.

Did it suck that Auburn didn’t have a prayer at playing for the title if neither #1 or #2 lost? You bet. That’s a separate issue though. Under the BCS system, conference, schedule, none of it mattered – #1 and #2 remained intact throughout the season, they woulda/coulda/shoulda played for the title in 2003, and there was nothing that would keep them from playing for the title in 2004.

It didn’t just get Troy Smith, though his 4-for-12, 35 yd. performance in the national championship game is about as ugly as it gets. Look how the top 10 Heisman finalists went out in their bowl games.

Troy Smith, Ohio State: dreadful
Darren McFadden, Arkansas: lost (89 yards)
Brady Quinn, Notre Dame: painful
Steve Slaton, West Virginia: injured, non-factor
Mike Hart, Michigan: lost (< 50 yards) Colt Brennan, Hawai'i: finally someone who played well Ray Rice, Rutgers: 170 yards, but no one saw him play Ian Johnson, Boise State: another big winner Dwayne Jarrett, Southern Cal: huge second half on the biggest Jan. 1st stage Calvin Johnson, Georgia Tech: great bowl but still lost If we're ranking them just according to bowl performance, the list gets flipped almost upside down:

1. Brennan
2. Jarrett
3. Calvin Johnson
4. Ray Rice
5. Ian Johnson
6. McFadden
7. Quinn
8. Hart
9. Smith
10. Slaton (injured)

It’s certainly not unusual for a successful team to have some staff turnover in the offseason, but LSU seems to be taking it on the chin this year.

• First they lost offensive line coach Stacy Searels to Georgia in a lateral move.
• Now, they’ve lost offensive coordinator Jimbo Fisher to FSU.
• We might not be finished – high-profile defensive coordinator Bo Pelini has been mentioned in connection with the Minnesota job.

Les Miles could have quite an HR crisis on his hands if both coordinators end up leaving. It’s never easy replacing such talented assistants, and it’s vital to your program that you have good people in place.

The weekend’s announcment that LSU offensive line coach Stacy Searels was coming back to his native Georgia seems to have met with favorable reviews. Searels, from Trion, Ga., played for Auburn and has coached the LSU line since 2003. LSU has had a quality front line over that span, and they’ve been effective running and passing the ball.

Though not many of us know enough about him to really evaluate the hire, Searels looks to have quite a legacy of success dating back to his All-American days at Auburn. So Auburn has a former UGA lineman in Hugh Nall coaching their line, and we now have Searels. Just more cross-pollination for these two programs.

Calvin Johnson announces that he will declare for the NFL draft.

Though Johnson will be a top draft pick and will be remembered as one of the best receivers to ever play at Georgia Tech, his career numbers against Georgia will always be the most bitter part of the Johnson-Ball-Gailey era:

9 receptions, 71 yards, 1 TD

When you lose in the final minute on the road to a Top 10 team that has a 30+ game home winning streak, it’s easy to pat yourself on the back for just competing and having a shot. The dreaded "moral victory" might even rear its head. Andy Landers is making sure that no such thing comes from yesterday’s ugly 57-55 loss at LSU. He was quick to point out after the game that there wasn’t much at all positive to take from this loss, and he’s exactly right. "It was really kind of a poor effort on our part in a lot of ways," he said. "The bottom line is we didn’t play well enough to win."

After taking an 18-4 lead, Georgia managed just 37 points over the final 31 minutes of the game. They committed 19 turnovers, allowed 14 LSU offensive rebounds, and only hit 20 shots as a team. You might credit LSU’s NCAA-leading defense for Georgia’s problems, but so many were self-inflicted. After taking a 53-48 lead inside of four minutes to go, Georgia only managed one basket the rest of the way. They were held scoreless during the game’s crucial final two and a half minutes. Good defense maybe, but there were also several missed chances.

It wasn’t so much a factor of inexperience. The freshmen actually had a decent day: Houts had four assists to one turnover. Marshall came off the bench to lead the team in scoring with a perfect 5-for-5 day, though she wasn’t nearly as effective on defense. But in games like this you look to the upperclassmen to lead the way, and they didn’t. Darrah had six turnovers and struggled shooting again. Chambers had only two points in the second half. Humphrey got herself in early foul trouble again and didn’t score in the first half. In the past couple of years, we’ve become so used to just handing the ball to Humphrey when Georgia needed a play, but that hasn’t been the case yet this season.

Chalk this loss up as just another "almost" in a frustrating six-game losing streak to LSU. Since handling them in Athens during the 2004 season, Georgia has watched LSU pass them by in the SEC heirarchy and squandered several chances to reclaim that turf, Sunday’s game included. They’ll get another chance to beat LSU in Athens later this year. Will we be talking about another "almost"?

Cori Chambers and Janese Hardrick combined for 42 points as Georgia trounced Florida 89-57. Chambers had 16 points within about 12 minutes, and Hardrick took over in the second half. Florida’s strategy to pack inside on Tasha Humphrey resulted in a frustrating night for the junior forward, but the outside shooters made them pay for it. The game was over by halftime as Georgia built nearly a 30-point lead. Things got predictably sloppy in the second half as reserves came in and out, but things were well in hand.

I was impressed with the defense. Hardrick in particular was very active. Though not everyone shot well, I thought most of the team was alert and doing the little things on both ends of the court. Angel Robinson impressed with some nice shots when she got loose inside. The bench play of Robinson and Christy Marshall was a good shot in the arm.

The Lady Dogs head to LSU for a 3:00 game on Sunday afternoon. They’ve come up close against LSU in the past couple of years, but it’s time to end a five-game losing streak to LSU and break through and reclaim some position in the SEC heirarchy.

It took Nick Saban about 17 seconds to come face-to-face with that unique animal known as the Alabama football fan. He was mobbed at the little Tuscaloosa airport and required a police escort to get through the crowd. Have you ever seen someone so uncomfortable as he looks around these people? Watch these two videos:

• Video #1
• Video #2

Of course this is Alabama football, and a school that has given us the Mike DuBose and Mike Price soap operas can’t just end a story like this without introducing alcohol and the law. Follow this link to read the tale of Ms. Alana Colette Connell, seen here giving the new coach a smooch and apparently a good whiff of a 9-martini lunch.

Remember, Nick…you chose this.

How many times have you or one of your buddies wanted to be a fly on the wall during halftime of a big game? Did the coach peel the paint off the walls? What adjustments were made?

Loran Smith comes through with a pretty interesting recap of the Georgia locker room at halftime of the Chick-fil-A Bowl. Down 21-3 after the first half, I know I wasn’t alone in wondering what the Dawgs did during halftime to turn the game around. Some things that stood out:

• The reassuring calm of Richt. Others did the screaming, but Richt was the steady force this time. I know Richt has a reputation for being too calm or stoic, but this was a time when it was called for. The Dawgs didn’t need a kick in the pants as much as they needed a break. Richt was plenty animated in the second half – if you saw him upset during a fourth quarter pass interference call, you know what I’m talking about.
• Martinez asking for, and receiving, turnovers. He told his defense, "you must make turnovers," and they delivered four in the second half. I didn’t know it was something as simple as just asking for them.
• Bobo stressing the importance of getting a few first downs for momentum. "It is simple. Make first downs." That’s why I called Raley’s catch in the third quarter the most important play of the game. It was Georgia’s first first down since their opening drive, and it began to tip both field position and momentum in Georgia’s favor.
• The onside kick as a rallying point. Hope is a key for anyone trying to overcome an adverse position. The job of coming back from 18 down against the nation’s best defense had to seem pretty hopeless. Sensing that, Richt put the team’s hope in that onside kick. It was a great tactic – it gave the team a visible lift in the locker room, and if it were executed in the game it would mean that the Dawgs had already put points on the board with momentum on their side. Obviously it worked.

Good insights from Loran.

Entering conference play, a basketball team hopes to be hitting its stride. You’ve had two months in which to test tactics and rotations against competition of varying quality. You want to start well because a few early setbacks in conference play can make the rest of the season an uphill climb.

But the Lady Dogs aren’t hitting their stride yet as they enter SEC play tonight against Florida. For reasons explained nicely by Marc Weiszer in the ABH, Coach Landers cautions that it might be at least mid-January before the team really gets into their groove. Off-season surgeries disrupted preseason conditioning and development. Tasha Humphrey’s suspension required a Plan B approach to the first month of the season (which worked way beyond my expectations). When Humphrey returned in early December, you had a team that was marginally conditioned and playing with all pieces for the first time in nearly 14 months.

The SEC isn’t very forgiving, and Georgia will have to find its form quickly. There are some obvious areas where improvement will have to come.

1. Start stronger. Georgia raced out ahead of Rutgers and Stanford in key early games, but they’ve struggled for the first ten minutes of several games in December. That’s fine against Richmond, but it will kill you at Baton Rouge.
2. Production from the point. We’re not only talking about points, though Ashley Houts hasn’t played to her November form in several weeks, but the tandem of Houts and Hardrick must also do better jobs as creators for the other players. The assists-to-turnovers number has to go way up.
3. Where is Darrah? Megan Darrah is in a big slump, and the Lady Dogs can’t afford an outage from the wing. Christy Marshall is looking good but is still a freshman. Darrah can be a real difference-maker when she’s on.
4. Turn up the defense. Georgia is scoring fewer points in large part because they are creating fewer transition chances. We got spoiled with Sherill Baker’s steals. If they aren’t going to be as prolific in creating steals (and who can be?), they’ll have to compensate with better halfcourt defense.

On paper, the Lady Dogs have some great pieces. Angel Robinson is coming along nicely inside. Chambers is a sharpshooter from outside. Humphrey should be free to cause trouble from the inside on out. Role players like Darrah and Marshall bring a tremendous amount of skill, but they must be more consistent. And point guard play must improve a good deal – we’ve seen what Hardrick and Houts are capable of.

Last year’s Lady Dogs emerged from December with an identity forged from off-season attrition, and they were able to roll through the SEC losing only to Tennessee and LSU. Though they were few in number, they had reliable parts – you could count on Humphrey to be strong inside, Chambers to shoot it up from outside, and Baker and Kendrick to control the backcourt. This year’s squad has yet to solidify around such consistent roles, and it could be a dicey few weeks as they try to find that identity.