Confirmation comes this morning of the news that broke late last night: Todd Grantham is Georgia’s new defensive coordinator. We’ve learned some additional details since last night:

• Grantham will finish out the season with the Cowboys. That was announced by Cowboys coach Wade Phillips this morning.
• Grantham will be replaced by former Syracuse head coach Paul Pasqualoni.
• According to Phillips, “this came up” – apparently meaning Grantham’s decision – at 9:00 Thursday morning during the Cowboys’ practice.
• Grantham’s deal is for 3 years at $750,000 per year according to Anthony Dasher of UGASports.com. That would make him the third-highest paid defensive coordinator in the nation.

Grantham stated that he looks forward to bringing a passive, uninsipred defense to Georgia that opponents would salivate over on film. No, actually, Grantham said this:

“I would like to thank Coach Mark Richt and Damon Evans for the opportunity for myself and my family to be part of the University of Georgia community,” said Grantham. “I’m very excited about being part of a staff that will work tremendously hard to return Georgia football to one of the premier teams in the SEC. To the fans and boosters of the University of Georgia, I understand the passion and standard of excellence expected. I look forward to developing an aggressive, physical, attacking style defense that offenses will not look forward to playing against.”

It sounds good…looking forward to seeing it in practice.

A few more thoughts:

• In December, the Banner-Herald reported that “Athletic director Damon Evans said this week that Georgia would be ‘competitive,’ in attracting candidates for any openings with salary and possibly offering multi-year contracts.” Some were skeptical just how willing Georgia would be to open up the checkbook, but the outcome shows that Evans meant every word of it, down to the multi-year contract – a first at Georgia for an assistant.
• Along those lines, I would imagine that Mike Bobo and his fellow assistants are smiling today. They’re not going to have their salaries more than doubled to $750,000, and they probably won’t see multi-year contracts. But the value of being an assistant at Georgia just went up today.
• Grantham’s decision to remain with the Cowboys probably won’t matter with recruiting. Georgia has plenty of great recruiters elsewhere on the staff. What mattered from the perspective of recruiting is that the uncertainty was removed. Grantham has everything up to videoconferencing at his disposal once the dead period ends should he need to contact anyone. Do we cheer for the Vikings regardless?
• Grantham, considered a 3-4 proponent, will surely be asked about what scheme he plans to bring to Georgia. I hope his answer goes something like this: “I have experience working with both a 4-3 and 3-4 defense, and I don’t intend to decide that right now. We’ll spend the next few months meeting with and getting to know the players in the program and decide as a staff which personnel and scheme gives Georgia the best chance to field a competitive and successful defense in the SEC.”
• Along with assembling the rest of the staff, we’ve heard rumblings about changes coming to Georgia’s conditioning program. We’d expect that to be wrapped up within the next two weeks as mat drills and pre-spring conditioning usually kicks off around or just before Signing Day.
• Wade Phillips had some very nice things to say about Grantham: “He’s grossly overqualified to be the defensive line coach. I knew that he would be a coordinator pretty quickly or even a head coach – he’s got all those qualities.

Grantham won’t be put to the test for another 7+ months, but for now Georgia has the man they’ll charge with rebuilding the Georgia defense that had deteriorated over the past couple of seasons. Fan reaction has been almost overwhelmingly positive, though it’s hard to tell how much of that has to do with relief over this long process finally coming to an end. The reality of getting down to work and producing results will come soon enough. For now, enjoy the weekend and tune in on Sunday at 1:00 to see Grantham’s current team and defensive line in action.

Gaines, signed to a 10-day contract with the Utah Jazz, came up big at the buzzer last night in a win over Cleveland. Not a bad way to get your first career NBA three-pointer on a night where he scored 9 points in 9 minutes on 3-3 shooting. Hopefully Jerry Sloan and the Jazz will heed the advice of the TNT broadcast and sign him for the rest of the season.

Don’t miss the great postgame interview either.

Photo: Dallas Morning News

Tom Dienhart, national senior college football writer for Rivals.com, is reporting that Dallas Cowboys defensive line coach Todd Grantham has signed to become Georgia’s defensive coordinator. According to Dienhart’s Twitter account,

Grantham’s deal is signed. it is for 3 years. he will be third highest paid DC in the nation.

Of course this announcement is just the beginning. Just a few of the questions we’ll be asking:

• There are still two other openings on the Georgia defensive staff, and Grantham figures to have input on those vacancies.
• It also remains to be seen if Grantham will remain with the Cowboys during their NFL playoff run.
• Given Grantham’s background as a defensive line coach, it also will be interesting to see how those duties are allocated between he and Rodney Garner.
• Grantham has experience with a 3-4 defensive alignment, but will he bring that look to Georgia? Do the Dawgs have the personnel to run a 3-4?

You’ll learn plenty about Grantham over the next few days, but start with the Grantham bio on Wikipedia. He has both college and pro experience, and he’s worked with both Frank Beamer and Nick Saban. The Leather Helmet Blog also has comprehensive biographical information. If you’re a Rivals.com subscriber, don’t miss this endorsement from Beamer.

Grantham has been defensive coordinator one other time in his career. From 2005-2007, he was the defensive coordinator for the Cleveland Browns – a position he chose over interest from Nick Saban in Miami. He got results, but he was fired after a disappointing 2007 season under some strange circumstances.

I won’t consider this over until he actually shows up in Athens, but it’s a relief to start to see the end of the process. I don’t care about the snark and hand-wringing from the Atlanta media, but some concrete news is important with fewer than three weeks left until Signing Day. We’ll see how Grantham (and, soon, the rest of the staff) play on the recruiting trail, but at least Mark Richt now has an answer for those questions.

Georgia’s perfect 16-0 start has featured wins over some tough competition, but all of their biggest wins have come at home. Their highest-profile road test so far might have been at Clemson – one of the lower-division ACC teams.

That changes tonight when the Lady Dogs head to Vanderbilt. Basketball fans – men or women – know that a trip to Nashville is rarely routine or easy, and Vanderbilt’s women’s team has enjoyed a strong couple of seasons and some success over Georgia. They were ranked not far behind Georgia in the mid-teens just a week ago, but consecutive losses have them at #24 currently. They’ll be motivated by their losing streak and the danger of falling out of the SEC race at an early point in the season.

With their other marquee SEC games against LSU and Tennessee in Athens, this is probably the toughest true road game Georgia will face all season, and it will be a significant challenge to Georgia’s unblemished record. The game is on Fox Sports South at 8:00 ET.

We’re disposed to treat a program in the position of Georgia basketball with kid gloves. That’s with good reason – any team has to be evaluated relative to expectations. Everyone realizes that the team is still building and that there’s only so much with which the new coaching staff has to work.

At the same time, the game is about absolutes. Wins and losses. Plays made or not made. Our guy matching up against their guy. In that world of absolutes, Georgia blew a good opportunity to knock off another ranked team last night. Georgia’s lack of depth was painfully obvious, and several good opportunities to score down the stretch were left just short at the rim. For a team with legitimate postseason expectations, it would have been a devastating home defeat that would loom large in March. For Georgia, it was a missed chance to land a big early SEC win and sustain the energy and enthusiasm that has been building in support of the program.

I doubt Mark Fox is very happy this morning. He was quick to distance himself from any of the patronizing pat-on-the-back stuff after the Kentucky loss by writing that “you’ll never cut open a winner and find they are good losers.” At any level of competition, these kinds of losses gnaw at you whether or not you were expected to win. It’s no consolation to Fox or the team, but it’s saying something that we’re left to dwell on the handful of plays that made a difference in a close game with nationally-ranked teams.

There was plenty to like last night. The start – even with the turnovers – was about as good as you’re going to see from Thompkins and Georgia. The Dawgs hung in and led at half despite playing Mississippi’s up-tempo style. They didn’t wilt when the Rebels made a push to start the second half and built a seven-point lead. They worked hard on the offensive glass to create 16 offensive rebounds. Travis Leslie contiunes to develop. Even when the shots didn’t fall, the offense created plenty of good looks even with the game on the line.

Georgia’s held their own against three ranked teams. Actually, if Missouri can handle Oklahoma this weekend, each of Georgia’s last five opponents will have been ranked at some point this year. But it doesn’t get easier with this stretch behind us. Mississippi State started the season in the polls and beat this same Ole Miss team. Tennessee and Florida are well known. Georgia has a lot to take from its results over the past week, and the consistency is encouraging, but landing that first SEC win is still a very important step in keeping things moving forward in Fox’s first year.

A Knoxville store owner is starting a drive to send Kiffin-themed “It’s Time” Tennessee gear to the devastated island.

Burks said Wednesday that any customer who brings in an “It’s Time” T-shirt can get 20 percent off the purchase of a new shirt. Burks said he’ll ship the old shirts to Haiti, which was devastated by an earthquake on Tuesday.

For those of us who were wise enough never to buy such things to begin with, there are plenty of other ways to donate to the relief effort. The easiest: text “HAITI” to 90999. $10 will be donated to the Red Cross for Haitian relief and billed to your cell phone.

Lane Kiffin, Norm Chow, and Ed Orgeron are all reuniting at Southern Cal. Will it turn out to be a pretty successful reunion along the lines of the Eagles or will it be more like David Lee Roth rejoining Van Halen?

Lane Kiffin and staff escape in the recruiting helicopter to avoid the rioting masses in Knoxville.

I’ll start with a more serious thought – instead of rioting or protesting, Tennessee fans and students should be partying. They’ll take a hit in the short term, but it pains me to say that they’ll be better off without Kiffin than they would have been with him. Put it this way – after everything shakes out I would wager that Southern Cal is looking for their next coach before Tennessee is. We know from boring stability here at Georgia, and – while it has its pitfalls – it’s not all bad considering.

• My first thoughts upon hearing the news went right to two people: JaWuan James and Lance Thompson. James is a standout offensive lineman at North Gwinnett who committed to Tennessee over Georgia. I have no idea if he’d reconsider, but he’ll have to make a decision soon: James is one of several early enrollees already on campus, and classes are set to begin. There are (unconfirmed) reports that those early enrollees would preserve their eligibility and be able to sign with another team if they don’t begin attending classes. Ed Orgeron is certainly working that angle as he tries on his way out the door to poach several of them. No doubt the door would still be open for James at Georgia; he’s one of the nation’s best prospects at a position of need for Georgia.
  As for Thompson, the Georgia native was Tennessee’s linebackers coach and has been a successful defensive coach for several area programs. Yes, he has a long relationship with Georgia Tech, and it will be interesting to see whether Paul Johnson puts Al Groh on hold to consider the availability of Thompson. I don’t think Thompson would be a candidate for the defensive coordinator position at Georgia, but he’d be a slam-dunk upgrade as linebackers coach. We don’t know whether he’s been offered a chance to head west with Kiffin, but his background, family, and recruiting contacts are all here in the southeast. He might not even leave Tennessee. There’s a timing issue also – Georgia has floated the idea that the new defensive coordinator will have input on the other defensive coaching vacancies, and Thompson might be off the market by the time Georgia settles their coordinator search (all the more reason to wrap that up ASAP).
• I was waiting for HeismanPundit to weigh in on this story, and he doesn’t disappoint. No one has sounded the alarm about Kiffin louder.
• One of my favorite observations last night came from Chris Brown of Smart Football. “Anyone else find it weird that thse all star USC coaches all are back, but now under Kiffin instead of Carroll?” Think that’s a pretty important detail?
• Then there’s the classic message board comment: “Like getting a divorce from a stripper.”
• Of all the names that are floated for the Tennessee job, David Cutcliffe strikes the most fear into the hearts of Georgia fans. We know why. I think we can relax though. First, I’m not so sure he gets the call, though he probably should. Other than it being unseemly to leave a program after one year (ahem), why didn’t they go after him when they had an opening last year? Is his health still a consideration? Also, Cutcliffe the coach seems to have slightly less juju over Georgia than Cutcliffe the coordinator.
• Along those lines, it’s not 2004 anymore. I understand why fans are excited to have Norm Chow back at Southern Cal, but his star seems to have faded somewhat from those glory days. You can blame the players and situations around him over the past five years, but then you’d also have to admit some pretty poor career decisions.
• And finally…as angry as people are in Knoxville, they’re not too thrilled in L.A. either.

Exaggeration or not, I believe this will be the one thing I remember about this story:

Multiple outlets in Alabama are quoting Nick Saban announcing today that defensive coordinator Kirby Smart will remain at Alabama, turning down an offer from Georgia.

Back to the drawing board…

Lady Dogs freshman Jasmine James has been named the SEC Freshman of the Week for the fourth time this season. This was the first time the weekly honors coincided with conference play, and James is a big part of the reason why the Lady Dogs are off to a 3-0 SEC start and a perfect 16-0 overall record. She poured in 17 points in Sunday’s win over Florida, and her three-pointer in the final minute of overtime proved to be the game-winner against Kentucky last Thursday.

Despite what seems like a pretty solid consensus to the contrary, something tells me to go with Texas.

Bonus MVP: Jordan Shipley

The Lady Dogs will attempt to establish the program’s best start ever tonight in the SEC home opener against Kentucky. Georgia is off to a 14-0 start and won their first conference game at Alabama on Sunday.

It’s fair to say that the program’s biggest challenges lay ahead with most of a competitive SEC schedule remaining. In-season winning streaks don’t mean much if they don’t turn into successful seasons. But the perfect start to this season is noteworthy because it comes on the heels of a disappointing 2008-2009 season which saw the program lose more than three consecutive games for the first time. That team made the NCAA Tournament by the slimmest of margins, but the state of the program didn’t sit well with anyone.

The offseason wasn’t kind to the Lady Dogs. A starting guard transferred. Senior Christy Marshall was lost for the year during the preseason due to a knee injury. That left the team with only five returning players with any kind of experience.

Hopes were lifted by one of the strongest recruiting classes of the decade. The story of the season so far has been those newcomers meshing well with a quality group of veterans. Fans know all about the stars – Houts, Phillips, and Robinson. The improvement of sophomore Meredith Mitchell has been key in replacing the production and athleticism lost when Marshall went down. The freshmen have stepped right in – Jasmine James has already won SEC Freshman of the Week honors several times and leads the team in scoring. Georgia’s top prep prospect, Anne Marie Armstrong, continues to gain confidence and has hit some big shots in big situations. Jasmine Hassell has been a very important player off the bench providing depth on the frontcourt behind Phillips and Robinson. Ebony Jones and Tamika Willis give Landers still more options at the forward spot.

Make no mistake – the team hasn’t been dominant. They’ve had to come from behind several times to win close, low-scoring games. The difference and key of course is that they won. They’ve come up with the defensive stop or clutch shot to preserve their record. What’s impressive is that many of those big plays have come from the newcomers who have shown the steadiness and effort you might not expect from freshmen. That tough and competitive nonconference slate that led to so many close games has prepared Georgia for the grind of SEC play where they’ll face that kind of test every night.

Unfortunately the possibility of frozen precipitation in north Georgia this evening will likely reduce the crowd for this potentially historic game. Kentucky’s a tough opponent and has improved in recent years under Matthew Mitchell. They beat Georgia twice just two seasons ago and pushed the Lady Dogs to the buzzer last year in Lexington. They’ve been off to a good start themselves this year with only one loss against them. They’re led by forward Victoria Dunlap, a dominating presence inside who averages nearly 20 points and 10 rebounds per game.

Key for Georgia will be applying defensive pressure. Kentucky turned the ball over 29 times in their only loss of the year, and Georgia has been very effective in creating turnovers to spark their offense this year. Georgia has struggled scoring at times, shooting under 40% for the season, so points created by defense could make a big difference tonight. Georgia’s inside duo of Porsha Phillips and Angel Robinson will have their hands full with Dunlap, but they’ll also have to avoid foul trouble and find ways to counter her on the offensive end.

It’s a great night to be a Georgia Bulldog. The evening started off with Mark Fox’s hoop Dawgs defending their home court. Outside shots fell, McPhee hit the shot of his life, and Thompkins took over as the Dawgs (again) sent a ranked and more talented Tech team home. More on that later.

If seeing Tech lose once wasn’t enough, Iowa came through with a nice win in the Orange Bowl. The Jackets couldn’t muster but a single scoring drive on offense, and Iowa was able to break open a close game with a late score. On behalf of the Bulldog Nation, we thank the Hawkeyes for giving us the chance to enjoy two Tech losses in a single evening.

If even that isn’t enough for you and you’re still up, Rudy is on CMT right now. Tech has lost on the court, the gridiron, and even in the movies tonight. Sleep well.

Image: Anti-Orange Page

Great news for a real Bulldog fan favorite. After tearing it up in the NBA Development League, Sundiata Gaines will reportedly sign with the Utah Jazz.

Utah Jazz general manager Kevin O’Connor announced today that the team will sign former Bulldog Sundiata Gaines, who now plays for the NBA Development League’s Idaho Stampede, to a 10-day contract pending the outcome of a successful physical on Wednesday.

Hopefully the 10-day contract will be extended and he’ll stick in the league. I can’t think of anyone who put in more effort during some dismal years in Athens, and he deserves this break.

New Georgia basketball coach Mark Fox has been pushing most of the right buttons when it comes to the fans, and the “Wreck Tech” ticket campaign shows he gets this too. There won’t be a more important game in his inaugural campaign than Tuesday night’s game against Georgia Tech.

Since the series returned to campus sites in 1995, Georgia hasn’t lost a game in Athens to their rival. Bulldog teams that made the NCAA Tournament or finished dead last in the SEC have found a way to win this one game. They’ve beaten pedestrian Tech teams as well as the eventual national runner-up that came in as #3 in 2004.

I know it’s not a conference game, and the series doesn’t have quite the same history on the basketball court as it does on the football field. But not much is expected in conference play from the Bulldogs this year, and a win over Tech is an opportunity for Fox to establish legitimacy in front of fans and the all-important local recruiting base. Georgia’s football and women’s basketball teams have already righted the rivalry in their respective sports. With football season behind us, the Tech game will be many casual fans’ first look at Fox’s team. Can they pull it off?

I didn’t intend to spend the better part of the holidays and bowl season away, but life had other plans. It’s about time to put the football season to bed and move on to the winter sports.

Football
So, right, there was the bowl. We spent so much of the year talking about how much more difficult the job was for our defense because of turnovers and disadvantageous field position. How nice to finally get a taste of what several Georgia opponents experienced this year. You wouldn’t know it from the final score, but Georgia’s offense wasn’t terribly impressive. Georgia’s 14 first half points required about 2 yards of offense. Credit the running game for putting it away and Cox for a nice touchdown pass to White that opened things up, but it was a nice change to see how things went with a little help from the opponent and no Kentucky-like meltdown.

Doug’s right – there’s not much long-term to take from the bowl. It was a lame duck game, and we know that much about the team will be different the next time they take the field. In a general sense, we can be excited about proven players at almost every position on offense except quarterback, and we can be skeptical about the unknown identity of the defense (especially if two key juniors move on).

Speaking of juniors moving on, I surely wasn’t alone in reading Rennie Curran blowing off a disciplinary running session (and his subsequent quarter-long suspension) as a sign that he will be declaring for the NFL draft. It took him a while to get going in the bowl game, but his third down stop on a quarterback scramble in the third quarter with A&M driving might have been the play of the game. The Aggies scored out of the gate in the second half, but after Curran’s stop and the disrupted fourth down attempt that followed, we didn’t hear much from the A&M offense the rest of the way.

So now we have three big storylines over the next month: 1) the new defensive coordinator and position coaches, 2) the draft-related decisions of Curran and Jones (and any other attrition), and 3) the final month of recruiting. How much each of those stories affects the others could be interesting – will the naming of the defensive staff affect recruiting (likely) or the decisions of the juniors (less likely)? In a month we’ll also be talking about mat drills and offseason conditioning, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see that get extra attention this year.

Men’s Hoops
Mark Fox’s first year is going about as expected. The Dawgs haven’t been able to lean on newcomers very much expect for situational minutes, so the cast is pretty familiar. Struggles on offense are unfortunately no surprise, but it is encouraging to see the system in action only a couple of years removed from the Sundiata Gaines-and-pray scheme. Shots are there, and hopefully there will soon be players in place to knock them down.

There have been bright spots. Travis Leslie’s development has been fun to watch. McPhee has done more than could be expected of him. Thompkins has come on strong late in December, and he’s starting to embrace his role. But spotty shooting and turnovers continue to plague the Dawgs and likely will all season.

The highlight of the season was definitely the win over Illinois in Gwinnett. That showcased everything good about this team – physical play inside, a big game from Thompkins, and timely plays by the guards. We were brought back to earth this past weekend at Missouri as the combination of early Thompkins foul trouble and relentless Missouri pressure turned the game into an alarming rout.

There was discussion whether Georgia’s win over Illinois was Mark Richt’s “Hobnail Boot” moment. In the sense that it was the new coach’s first high-profile win, OK. But Illinois was unranked. They’re a good, but not great, team. Dennis Felton managed to knock off #3 Georgia Tech (not to mention Florida) in his first season. If we’re looking for a signature win to get the Fox program off and running, I hope we can do better this year than Illinois. A win this week over a ranked Tech team would go a long way.

Women’s Hoops
Georgia overcame a 10-point halftime deficit by holding Alabama to only 14 second half points and escaped Tuscaloosa with a win in the SEC opener. The Lady Dogs are off to an undefeated 14-0 start and are ranked in the top 10. The perfect record hasn’t been built entirely on easy wins – they’ve beaten teams like Oklahoma, Rutgers, Virginia, and Georgia Tech who are all bound for the NCAA Tournament and have been ranked this year.

A good core of seniors has been augmented by an exciting group of freshmen. The development of sophomore win Meredith Mitchell has been a great shot in the arm. Freshman guard Jasmine James is one of the most entertaining and capable shooting guards the team has had in years.

The one caution with the women’s team is on offense. The team is shooting under 40% for the year, and it got them in a hole against Alabama. They’ve needed late rallies to win several games. To their credit the defense has held tough and made it possible to overcome poor shooting nights. They’re winning games that would be losses over the past couple of seasons. The shooting is going to have to come around against better SEC competition though.

The team hosts Kentucky and Florida over the next week, and it’s a bit like playing South Carolina in football. Neither will win the SEC, but they’re respectable teams that will provide serious challenges and should serve as early measurements of Georgia’s SEC prospects. If they can beat Kentucky it would mark the best start in the program’s storied history. UK is much improved in recent years though, and they only have one blemish so far this season themselves.