The News of Uga VI's Demise

Image: Georgiadogs.com

The news of his demise have been greatly exaggerated. Apparently, rumors started to swirl last week that 2007 would be Uga VI's last season. Early yesterday afternoon, the AJC ran an interview with Sonny Seiler, UGA's owner, and made it sound like his retirement in 2007 was a near sure thing.

Shortly after that, Josh Kendall of the Macon Telegraph, ran an article interviewing Seiler again that stated specifically that there is no specific timeline for naming Uga VII . Kendall's article also shed more light on Uga VI's health. After the Macon Telegraph article ran, the AJC went back and toned their article down considerably.

Regardless, he is advancing in years, and we probably aren't more than a season or two removed from a passing of the bone. But there's no sense rushing a legend out the door.

Before the 2006 season, I ran an article asking how much longer would Uga VI stay on the job. That article talks about some of the history of the Uga line, and it provides links to more dawgly info. It might be of interest to you.

See Also:
-- Uga VI Photo Gallery - AJC
-- Uga VI: On the Job - ABH

PWD

Another New Feature: True Peekaboo Posts

It's no flux capacitor, but it'll do.
I feel like I just discovered cold fusion. Via the blessed help of Hackosphere's web site, I've implemented a better Expandable Post feature to help you skim the site...regardless of the length of my posts.

In the previous version of the expandable post feature (last week's upgrade), if you clicked on "Read More" the link took you to a new page. It also didn't hold your place. If I inserted the "read more" link in Paragraph 5, you had to jump to a new page and scroll down for 5 paragraphs to find your old place. Sort of defeated the purpose of the feature.

Try the new Peek-a-Boo Expanded Post feature below.


As you can see, the post expands on your screen without taking you to a new page. For a guy with my rudimentary HTML skillz, this is a big win. Thank heavens for color-coded cut and paste instructions.

(BTW -- if you don't/didn't see the "+/- Read More" link, it's hopefully because you accessed this page directly. Go to the front page of the site to test again.)

Here's the catch = I'm still having problems with Internet Explorer on this computer. Therefore, I have only tested this in Firefox. I need one of you to test and make sure it works on IE6 and IE7. If it's busted, let me know. It's designed to work like this.

Let me know what you think / if it works.

More on Felton's contract extension from Damon Evans

Damon was very diplomatic describing his expectations for continued improvement while commending Felton for his progress to date.

See Also:
-- Felton's raise - ABH
-- Four more years - AJC
-- Evans looking for improvements - DawgPost.com
-- Felton's extension - UGAsports.com

pwd

The Sun Rises in the West -- I agree with Terrence Moore

As others have said, it's a shocking experience to read a Terrence Moore article and agree with every word of it. Today, he writes an incredibly interesting article about Tubby Smith's decision to leave Georgia for UK.

He interviews former UGA assistant athetic director Dick Bestwick, and he talks about the process of trying to convince Tubby to stay at Georgia. Bestwick's story in no way matches the incredibly absurd stories that have floated around regarding Dooley allegdly telling Tubby that he'd be stupid not to go to Kentucky. That part is a comforting read.

(Image: Tubby at Georgia)

Bestwick also talks about the upside of the Georgia job in terms of in state recruiting talent. A negative person will read the article and say "what could've been." A positive person would look at it and say "SEE. The opportunity at Georgia is huge." Regardless, It's a solid read for any UGA b-ball fan.

In other hoops news:
Georgia will offer Dennis Felton a 2 year extension. The extension will give him four full years remaining on his deal. I've said numerous times....

...that Felton needed a contract extension for two reasons:

A. He has improved the program steadily over the past 3 years.
B. He needs it for recruiting purposes.

Whether you believe Felton is the right answer long term or not has no bearing on the decision of whether or not to extend his contract in the short term. We need to keep the pipeline of talent alive. The UGA coach of the future (Felton or someone else) needs a solid talent base, or he won't be successful. That's why you give the extension. You either fire him (not a realistic option) or extend his deal.

Although, I will say that I got a chuckle out of the idea that other schools are looking at Felton to be their head coach (Note: This was a comment in an early version of an AJC article. That comment was later removed). I'm so sure that programs across the country are just beating down his door. "Hey, we're looking for a guy with no NCAA Tourney wins, a career losing record in major conference basketball and an offense that makes you want to claw your eyes out. You interested?"

Felton needs to finish our rebuilding job to get a sniff on a better gig. That's not being mean. It's just the brutal reality.

See Also:
-- Dick Bestwick's Bio - Wikipedia
-- Felton staying at UGA - AJC
-- Hot Coaching Names Part I - MGoBlog
-- Hot Coaching Names Part II - MGoBlog
-- Hot Coaching Names Part III - MGoBlog

PWD

Pissing Excellence

Auburn's national champion diver, Steven Segerlin, was busting taking a whiz in an Athens Parking Deck on Saturday. That would've been funny enough in and of itself, but he made matters worse by giving the cops a fake ID.

Now...if he had gotten the ID from Tanner Strickland's guy...that would make this story 10x funnier. David Ching has all the details in the Columbus-Ledger.

See Also:
-- The Triple Lindy (8 mb) - Rodney.com

PWD

Strickland won't miss playing time

Good news... the punishment fits the crime. Josh Kendall reports that Strickland won't miss playing time:

Strickland will not miss any game or practice time due to the arrest but will be required to complete what head coach Mark Richt referred to as “in-house” discipline, Richt said after practice Monday. In-house discipline generally means punishment running and community service.

PWD

Hoops Suggestion: Smarter Scheduling

Groo at expressed this better than I will, but Georgia needs to improve its basketball scheduling. Many fans clamor for improvements at the top of their non-conference schedule. However, I think Georgia needs improvement at the bottom end of its out of conference lineup. As Groo pointed out:

This year Georgia played Southern (RPI 289), Jacksonville (RPI 198), South Carolina State (RPI 288), Alabama A&M (RPI 334), Gardner-Webb (RPI 268), and Kennesaw (277). Those games are boat anchors to a team’s perceived strength. The Dawgs couldn’t even count a win over Valdosta State (in terms of the RPI) because the Blazers are a Division 2 school.

It's important to note that Georgia isn't a HBCU institution; therefore, we probably don't need to play 3 HBCU schools per year.


As Groo pointed out, playing schools with an RPI sub-250 is a major drain on RPI. When Georgia beat Kennesaw State in February, our RPI dropped 8 spots. Groo also correctly points out:

"Hold on a second," you say. "Georgia had the #14 schedule according to Palm’s collegerpi.com. Why are you talking about schedule?" Sure they did. They play in the SEC East. The only SEC East team without a top 30 schedule was Florida. The strong conference schedule masks the fact that the nonconference schedule had problems.

If you play the #1 RPI team and you play the #300 RPI team, they only average at 150. So you beat one and you lose to the other. If you played two RPI teams in the 50-100 range, you might get two wins AND the two teams would have an average RPI at around 60-75. Now, I'm no bracketologist, but I think the latter offers a greater opportunity for post-season success / participation.

I'm all for playing 1 or 2 "Ben Hur" type non-conference games. I loved the epic overtime game with #1 UNC in '97 (loss), the thrilling victory over #2 Pitt in '02 and this year's Wisconsin game was good for the program.

Making the tourney is about scheduling smart.
Not scheduling hard.
Jim Harrick had lots of flaws, and many of them I've beaten into the ground here. But the guy was the absolute master scheduler. He correctly saw the value in scheduling teams with an RPI around 30-125 and avoiding the real dregs of college basketball.25

What we can learn from Harrick's scheduling:
-- Load up on mid-tier power conference and mid-major teams. Harrick signed and extended multi-year deals with Colorado and Minnesota. He also played Pepperdine and Villanova (when they were medicore) on the road.

-- Utilize neutral site games as much as possible. He scheduled Georgetown in Springfield, Ma (W), Cal in Oakland (W), Texas in Madison Square Garden (L), NCSU in Atlanta (W). He even played Georgia Southern in Savannah, which was brilliant in that the RPI gives you greater credit for winning in a neutral setting than winning at home.

(Image: Ezra Williams vs. Georgetown)

-- Utilize REAL pre-season tourneys. The sham Paradise Jam tourney that Felton signed us up for in 2006 was a mockery. We played Old Dominion (RPI: 73 loss), Fordham (RPI: 126 Win) and EKU (RPI 267 W). Harrick sent us to Maui (a variety of mid-tier guys + Hawaii), Alaska (KU, Louisville and Grambling) and San Juan (Indiana St., Utah and Stanford). The Alaska thing was overly aggressive, but otherwise a good model to consider.

-- Avoid the worst of the worst. Harrick did a great job of steering clear of the bottom feeders of college hoops. Sure, we played Mercer, Georgia Southern, Georgia State, Appy State, UW-M, South Alabama and Belmont. But he didn't play them all in 1 year! In fact, in glancing at Ken Pomeroy's RPI archives, it looks like Harrick only scheduled 1 or 2 sub-RPI 250 teams per year, and he only played an RPI sub-300 team once (Grambling in Alaska).

Whereas, Felton has been scheduling 4-6 of those teams per year.

Who fits the profile of ideal teams for us to play?
I thought Felton had struck gold with the Oregon State match-up. A bottom tier Power Conference team is always a great scheduling move to fill up the lower half of the non-conference slate.

Others that might fit the profile of traditional mid to lower tier power conference teams include Baylor, Colorado, Nebraska, Northwestern, Minnesota (pre-Tubby), Penn State, Iowa State, Rutgers, DePaul, Seton Hall, Miami, Clemson, Arizona State, or Oregon State. See also: Tulane, Houston, UAB, Southern Miss, UMass, St. Louis, St. Joe's, Colorado State, etc. Yes, some of these are currently ranked below 200 in the RPI, but they are consistently going to pull a respectable RPI.

Next year's Schedule

Road: WKU and Wisconsin

Home: GT, Wake and Clemson (if we renew)

Neutral: Gonzaga (Seattle), Duke (NYC / Rumored) and TBD (Gwinnett/ATL)

Scheduling for post-tourney participation is a science. Not an art.

PWD

Fulmer Cup Alert: Georgia OL Has Warrant Issued for Arrest

"Alright, listen up, people. Our fugitive has been on the run for 90 minutes. Average foot speed over uneven ground barring injuries is 4 miles-per-hour. That gives us a radius of six miles. What I want from each and every one of you is a hard-target search of every dorm room, sorority room, frat room, weight room, dining room, chemistry lab and DMV in that area. Checkpoints go up at fifteen miles. Your fugitive's name is Tanner Strickland. Go get him. -- Deputy Marshal Samuel Gerard

- - - - -
Score another point for "Internet Speeds Distribution of Information." David Ching, beat writer for the Columbus-Ledger, reports on his blog that Georgia Bulldog offensive lineman Tanner Strickland allegedly has a warrant out for his arrest from the UGA Police Department.

That's right....the internets and ebays knew about Strickland's upcoming visit to the pokey before he did. And who says the internet is worthless.

Hopefully, he's reading this now and is preparing to jump a cargo plane to Bolivia in search of the one armed man who was the real felon in this case. Wait...I'm kidding. It's not that big a deal.

Scenario / Timeline...

-- Student gains possession of Fake ID
-- Student with Fake ID gets caught up in super secret Fake ID Dragnet
-- Wyatt Earp issues warrant for student(s)
-- Student gets arrested -- hasn't happened yet
-- Richt decides punishment -- TBD

Prediction:
As long as he's not the ring leader of the Fake ID distribution program, he'll get 1 game suspension. If he is, then he's got bigger issues. At Tennessee, Fulmer would've gotten the kid advance placement credits for small business and entrepreneurship skills.

If he had Mike Vick's PR Guy, he would just announce that he needed the fake ID to help him rent a car.

PS -- This kid enrolled early. He would've been in high school today if he hadn't fast tracked his graduation. I'd imagine that his parents are probably shitting a chicken right about now. You know how these things get blown out of proportion on the internet (insert guilty blogger's name here). Some friend of the family has probably called the house already saying, "I read on the Internets that there is a massive man hunt for your little boy."

Right about now...I'm glad I have no offspring to get involved in whacky college hi jinx. That said, what this kid needs now is a nickname. If Ian Smith is Tater Salad, should Tanner Strickland be "Dr. Kimble." I'm really open to suggestions here.

I have no idea how Orson will score a pre-arrest Fulmer Cup point.

See Also
-- Hell, he looks 21 to me - AJC
-- Arrest Warrent Issued for Strickland - AJC
-- 3 in Athens charged with Fraud ID Program - AJC

(BTW - I'm on record for having made fun of myself for being arrested for doing dumber things at a much older age. He ain't the first kid with a fake ID, and he won't be the last. It's not that big a deal to me.)PWD

Quick Thought on Recruiting

The early commits continued to pour in for the Dawgs. Last week, we landed our 10th commit when Boykin (CB) told the Dawgs "yes."

The All-Star cast continues to gain momentum as we're making huge progress with all-everything A.J. Harmon of Jefferson County. If Harmon pulls the trigger on an early UGA commitment, we could end up with as many as four 5-star kids committed before the season kicks off. (Image: AJ Harmon. DawgPost.com)

Look at some of these all-stars:

• AJ Green (WR): Likely #1 WR in the country. Mortal lock for 5 star status.
  
• DeAngelo Tyson (DT): One of the Top DTs in the Southeast. Strong candidate for 5 star status.
  
• AJ Harmon (OT): Top OL in Georgia, and one of the most saught after linemen in America. A monster (6'8" 6'5" 320+ lbs) in state player at a position of extreme need.
  
• Cornelius Washington (DE): Blistering fast defensive end. Another candidate for 5 star status?
  
• BJ Brand (OG): Top Guard in State?
  
• Dwayne Allen (TE): Top TE recruit in North Carolina. 4 star type kid.

And there's more on the list, and more on the way.

Here's the thing. I don't think "stars" translate to victories. However, I do think that highly recruited kids want to play with other highly recruited kids. Success brings more success. I love the momentum we're showing.

Nothing above is ground breaking news. I just wanted to express my glee with the progress so far.

PWD

Hoops Suggestion for Next Year: A Better Showing for TV

We're currently struggling to get the season ticket holders with prime seats behind the team benches to consistently show up for games. This isn't a new problem. We even had this issue when Harrick's final two squads were selling out every SEC Home game.

The costs of the tickets and contributions for those seats are relatively low. Therefore, someone with modest disposable income can cost justify attending only a few prime weekend games and/or UK or UF while wasting the remaining tickets. Unfortunately, those empty seats are prominently featured on TV.

The Suggestions....

Suggestion 1: Move the TV camera perspective to the opposite side of the arena. Duke (and I think LSU) do this. They showcase the student section side of the crowd instead of the coaches side. I recently suggested this to the proper folks at Butts-Mehre. It turns out that we did this in the past (some time pre-'94). Unfortunately, switching the TV pespective has legitimate logistical, advertising, signage and premium seating challenges. It's a tricky issues, but it's a switch I'd like to see us make.

Suggestion 2: Test an aftermarket ticket reseller program similar to Stubhub.com that gives season ticket holders the ability to return tickets or sell their tickets to other fans. This could give fans the ability to purchase premium tickets from other fans. Many college programs including Alabama, Mississippi State, Southern Cal, Georgetown and others utlize such after market ticket exchanges. However, I have no idea if they are successful or not.

(Full Disclosure: The Georgia Sports Blog is an affiliate for Stubhub.com. However, I'm curious about these programs regardless of the vendor or in-house provider).

For the suggestions from last week, click here and here.

pwd

2007 Season Travel -- Team Hotel Info

From Georgiadogs.com...team hotel info for road games.

2007 FOOTBALL HEADQUARTERS
ALABAMA	Birmingham Marriott
Sept. 22, 2007	3590 Grandview Parkway
205-968-3775	Birmingham, AL 35243
TENNESSEE	Hilton Knoxville Airport
Oct. 6, 2007	2001 Alcoa Highway
865-970-4300	Alcoa, TN 37701
VANDERBILT	Marriott Nashville Airport
Oct. 13, 2007	600 Marriott Dr.
615-889-9300	Nashville, TN 37214
FLORIDA	The Renaissance Resort at
Oct. 27, 2007	World Golf Village
904-940-8646	500 South Legacy Trail
	St. Augustine, FL 32092
GEORGIA TECH	The Omni CNN Center
Nov. 24, 2007	100 CNN Center
404-818-4370	Atlanta, GA 30303

PWD

Spring Practice Player Profiles

Image: Georgiadogs.com

I haven't done as much linking to Spring Practice reports, so I'm going to play catch up and knock a bunch of player, position and coach profiles out of the way all at once. You've seen most of them on other internets already, but here goes. (the last few days only)

Offense:
-- Friday's injury update on J. Davis and Vance - DawgPost.com
-- Buzz Around Moreno Grows- Macon Telegraph
-- Q&A with Eason - UGASports.com
-- Mikey Henderson's confidence - DawgPost.com
-- Bobo struggles with "cause and effect" - ABH***

Defense:
-- Miller in the Middle - AJC
-- Byrd ahead in Safety Battle - ABH
-- Prince Miller - MaconTelegraph
-- Kiante Tripp Q&A - UGASports.com
-- Good competition at Safety - Savannah Now

In my opinion, the most important of those articles is the one about Brandon Miller moving to the middle. As the article correctly points out, he really hasn't made any impact plays of note ini three years despite heavy playing time at the SAM linebacker position.

All the news about his move is positive, and he appears to be adjusting to the new position. My expectations are pretty low given the production of the past three years, but if he turns it on in the middle it would be enormous for the development of this defense. Best of luck to him. Late bloomers are a great thing.

PWD


***The Bobo headline is sarcasm. I'm only kidding.

Georgia gets commitment from CB

Brandon Boykin (5'11" 170 lbs.) committed to Mark Richt and the Georgia Bulldogs. The Fayette County star told DawgPost.com:

"I know the secondary at Georgia is very deep. I also know that I will have to work my way into playing time,” Boykin said. “A lot of guys just want to go to college and play a couple of years and go into the league (NFL), but it doesn’t work like that. You have to put in the time. When we talked about all of that I knew they were being real with me."

His list of offers so far isn't overwhelming, but it's still early. Georgia Tech was apparently interested, but he might have gotten lost in their coaching shuffle. One thing our coaching staff excels at is targeting the right DBs.

See Also
-- Boykin is a Bulldog - UGAsports.com
-- Georgia's Commit List - UGASports.com

PWD

Some Subtle New Site Features

I added a series of features to take advantage of new blogger.com functionality and to clean up the place a bit.

NOTE: I haven't tested any of these features on IE6 or IE7 b/c my IE is totally busted (long story). If you're using those browsers could you PLEASE check and make sure the stuff described below works! My email is decaturdawg at hotmail. Thanks.

My Longwindedness and "Read More"
I admit that at times I can get a little long winded. To make the front page easier to read/skim, I finally added a "Read More" feature for exceptionally long posts. When I write something super long (like the hoop articles below), I'll break them up with a "Page 2" feature. I'm not going to go back and add this feature to old posts. But I'll use it going forward.

Where are the Social Bookmarks?
At the end of the posts, you'll now find "DiggIt" and "Del.icio.us" links. If you're a user of those services, I'd appreciate you tagging any posts you like. It helps me drive traffic. If you're not a user of those sites, you can learn more about them here and here. I didn't add an "Share on Facebook" link yet. If that's something of interest to you let me know, and I'll try and figure out the code. (Note: I'm an HTML idiot. I'm almost totally reliant on Hackosphere)

Blog Roll De-Cluttering
Prior to the last upgrade, I had a much more organized blog roll (a list of sites that I read / recommend). I finally made time to update the list, delete inactive sites, added a "5 star" rating so you could find the best of the best faster, and organize them into categories better. I also added a new collection of resources such as links to the College Football Data Warehouse and various 2007 Football TV sites. I'll update that resource more later.

Click the "read more" to see what else is in store in the future.


I can't decide if I like the way I broke up the merchandise ads or not. I may tweak the appearance of that stuff more later. Also, I'm going to bring the Google Ads back once I figure out how the hell to do it without them looking like total crap.

Another feature still under consideration...I may add the "Labels" feature into the sidebar. Below my articles, I list things like "UGA", "Future Schedules", "The Other White Meat", etc. Those labels link to all other articles that I've tagged with that label. I want to add that into the sidebar, but Blogger doesn't do it the way I want to do it. So I'll have to clean up / overhaul my labels dramatically to make it work. I'm not eager for that.

I'm also looking to add news feeds into the site, but that would require moving to a wider screen and a 3 column approach size. Some of you (read: My dad) access the size on an 800x600 screen. Moving to 3 columns would screw you guys. So I'll wait on that feature. Brian at MGoBlog did a great job with his news feed. Look for the mgo.licio.us link on the right side of his site.

Otherwise, let me know what you want to see added.

Paul Westerdawg
Ring Leader
Georgia Sports Blog

Ben Watson tours Iraq

Damn. Good. Dawg. Watson talks about his USO tour of Iraq (Boston Herald)

PWD

Hoops Suggestion for Next Year: Get the Next Dozier Enrolled

Image: YahooSports. Click to enlarge
In Felton's second recruiting season, he signed Robert Dozier out of Lithonia High School. Dozier looked to have the SAT score and the game to help the Dawgs at forward, and he was listed as one of the Top 3-5 players in state. Given our perception, probation and win-loss problems at the time, Dozier looked to be quite the recruiting coup for Felton.

Unfortunately, Dozier's SAT score was flagged by the NCAA Clearinghouse, and he had to spend a year at a prep school instead of at Georgia. Upon completion of his prep tenure, he didn't re-sign with the Bulldogs.

I've heard that UGA admissions was nervous about the scenario surrounding his SAT score being flagged in the first place. Who knows if that's totally accurate or not. Given our issues with Larry Turner and Alexander Johnson's hocus pocus inflated SAT scores, I'm not shocked or uncomfortable with not pursuing or re-signing him.

But not having a player like him is a big deal.

Currently, Dozier is a 6'9" 215 lb forward for the 31-3 Memphis Tigers. LSU, UK, UF and Bama always seems to have long, athletic, agile guys like Dozier stacked up like cord wood. We. Do. Not.

His game reminds me of a taller, more nimble but not as physical Jumaine Jones. That's the closest description of a recent Dawg that I can think of.

In the NCAA Tourney's 2nd Round, he was matched up against All-American candidate Nick Fazekas of Nevada, and he more than held his own when assigned to the senior all-star. On the season he averaged 10 points and 6 rebounds in 25 minutes of play per game.

You can't give Felton credit for recruiting a kid that doesn't enroll. If you did, you'd also have to give Harrick credit for recruiting Alexander Johnson, Larry Turner, Julius Lamptey, etc. While giving Ray Goff credit for signing George Lombard, and Eddie Fogler credit for almost signing Kevin Garnett.

Regardless, Dozier is the type of kid this program MUST find a way to get enrolled. He could've been a huge difference maker on this Georgia team. Felton has proven that he can get a kid like that interested and signed. We just have to cross the finish line with guys like him, and get them enrolled.

While we're on the topic....Gwinnett County is currently loaded with talented guys who might become difference makers like Dozier. After some initial success with signing Mercer, Channing Toney, Louis Williams and Billy Humphrey, our Gwinnett "pipeline" (sic) has cooled considerably. It badly needs to heat back up.

See Also:
-- Robert Dozier's Stats - ESPN.com
-- Dozier Player Profile - GoTigersGo.com
-- Gwinnett County Basketball Talent Pool - AJC.com

PWD

Hoops Suggestion for Next Year: Find Another Takais

Image: Georgiadogs.com

When a college basketball coaching staff searches the JUCO ranks for a power forward, they are looking for a guy exactly like Takais Brown. A 6'8" 240 lb. grown ass man that immediately walks into a power conference and averages 14.6 points and 5.6 rebounds per game. That is success. For Georgia to accelerate the pace of its turn around, I think we need another JUCO impact player.

Why now?
We've signed several front court players for the class of 2007-2008. But I don't think any of them are going to start for Georgia next year. Assuming Mercer comes back healthy next year, our starting lineup probably looks like this:

PG - S. Gaines
SG - M. Mercer
SF - T. Woodbury
PF - T. Brown
C - R. Singleton

Singleton improved dramatically at the defensive end from Year 1 to Year 2, but his hands, rebounding, passing and offense still need a *ton* of work. Albert Jackson (injured) is still very raw, and Dave Bliss isn't a full time solution because of his bad back. We need another somewhat polished big man who can compete in the SEC. I'm not sure Jeremy Price is that guy next year either. Hopefully, he is. In my opinion, we need another JUCU big man.

Realistically, we also need another shooter. Hopefully, Terrance Woodbury and Billy Humphrey can combine to replace Levi Stukes' outside shot. It's more realistic to hope those two find consistency in their outside game than to hope Jackson, Singleton and Bliss become SEC Caliber starters at the Center position.

Obviously, JUCO big men like Takais don't grow on trees, and I'm not confident that we're even looking for one. But I think we should consider it.

That said, one of the most reliable sources around the UGA program is "elevator" on the UGAsports.com message board. He's a former UGA player, assistant coach and radio color man. He says Georgia is looking at two JUCO guards that are "ready to step in immediately and make a real difference." If Felton can land a scoring combo guard or swingman like Tubby landed in '96 with Katu Davis, that would be huge.

Either way, we need 1 or 2 more players who are SEC Caliber starters immediately.

See Also:
-- Signing class for 2007-2008 - Scout.com

PWD

Hoops: Where the Dawgs Improved in 2007

Image: georgiadogs.com

Judging a program like Georgia's that is pursuing such a tremendous rebuilding job requires a longer view than game to game or even week to week. You have to look year to year.

When you consider that Felton has improved from 12th to 11th to tied for 5th in the SEC overall during the past three years, that's improvement. When you see his SEC win total rise from 2 to 5 to 8 over the past 3 years, that's also improvement.

This season also saw only our third SEC Tournament win since Tubby left 10 years ago. Felton has two of the three wins. We also returned to the post-season, which was the minimum requirement for calling this season "progress."

When you see all of this happening for a program that 4 years ago had no juniors, sophomores or healthy freshmen, that's all progress.

The Numbers:
A look inside the numbers shows other areas of improvement and opportunities to do better.

Stats	2007 (SEC rank)	2006 (SEC rank)	Comments
Offensive Points/Game	75.1 (5th)	70.3 (6th)	Improved, but they averaged 69.1 points / game in SEC play in '07.
Defensive Points Allowed	69.1 (7th)	70.9 (11th)	Improvement relative to others, but we're still giving up way too many per game vs. our peers.
Total Rebounds	37.9 (3rd)	34.8 (7th)	Nice improvement.
Offensive Reb.	14.03 (1st)	13.13 (3rd)	If it weren't for offensive put backs from the boards, our scoring really would look bad.
FG percentage	.462 (4th)	.431 (12th)	Great improvement! Mostly from adding Takais.
3 pt. percentage	.381 (2nd)	.340 (8th)	Solid improvement.
3 pt. percentage Defensive	.359 (11th)	.349 (6th)	Regressed.
Assists / game	14.67 (8th)	12.57 (10th)	Still way too low.
Turnover Margin	0.24 (5th)	+2.0 (4th)
Assists to Turnover Ratio	0.93 (12th)	.81 (11th)	Still no progress.
Rebounding Margin	+5.7 (2nd)	-2.0 (11th)	Exceptional improvement.
Steals	8.88 (2nd)	9.07 (2nd)	Gaines and Mercer are beasts, and they aren't alone.

Felton is making progress, but there are still HUGE flaws in our game. Flaws that haven't changed in his four years. Poor ball and player movement and bad turnover to assist ratios plague us on the offensive end.

On the defensive end, we give up WAY too many points from a coach who considers himself a "defense first" type of guy. When you consider what we have to sacrifice as basketball fans on the offensive end to watch paint dry from a scheme standpoint, it is inexplicable why we don't have a better defense by now.

The only numbers that are misleading are the rebounding stats. You could look at those rebounding numbers and assume that our big men are much better than they are. Sundiata Gaines, Mike Mercer, and Billy Humphrey are as good at rebounding as any guards their size in the country. We need to improve our front court rebounding in 2008.

The Players:
The two biggest improvements in personnel were Sundiata Gaines and Takais Brown. Brown became everything Felton could've ever hoped for and more. We'll cover that topic in more detail soon. Gaines has also evolved his game, and he became one of the better point guards in the SEC this year.

Woodbury also showed inconsistent flashes of greatness. His performance in Rupp Arena reminded me of a very raw Jarvis Hayes type game. However, his performance in many other games reminded more of Derrick Dukes (ie: no defense for long stretches and streaky as hell). Regardless, the kid has huge upside.

Rashad Singleton also made big strides defensively. Unfortunately, he is as useless as tits on a bull on the offensive end. But he's making progress.

Prior to the injury, Mercer was having a standout year. He still struggles with shot selection, but his retooled shot did look better than his FR year. Several of the players took big steps in 2007.


The team also had to overcome incredible adversity this year.

Overall:
All in all, we improved year over year. The pace of improvement is still slower than anyone would like. Given the pace of progress, it's hard at this point to look to the 2007-2008 and expect anything less than an NCAA tourney appearance. Anything short of that goal would be either stagnation or regression, and we don't have the time for either.

It's time for Felton to take the next logical step. If not, there will / should be some hard decisions in Athens next year.

I'll offer some thoughts / suggestions on how the program can improve over the next few days.

Agree or disagree? Feel free to comment.

See Also:
-- Chip Towers Season recap - AJC

PWD

Yeah Me

My impressions of Spurrier and Pat Dye get a shout out on EDSBS. Those are two of the only impressions that I do that don't wander wildly in quality only to end up sounding like Apu from the Simpsons by the end of the bit.

At some point, Orson and I should do an entire fake Finebaum show. His Paul Finebaum routine is a riot. Sadly this link doesn't take you to audio of me. But it does lead to a Spurrier impression.

PWD

Shock and Awe

Image: georgiadogs.com

Monday night the US Air Force registered their biggest blowout victory since the 2003 bombings in Iraq. They clobbered Georgia by a score of 83-52. We don't do well against a team that back screens us to death. That's Air Force's entire deal. To quote the Athens Banner:

Air Force frazzled Georgia's defense, slashing the Bulldogs with quick cuts through the lane and burning them with 3-pointers. Defensively, the Bulldogs chased Air Force's collection of quick, disciplined players like they were playing duck-duck goose. Georgia was the goose.

"The things that they do just really showed our weakness," senior Levi Stukes said. "They moved without the ball and back cut us and softened us up. Once you get a team rolling like that, it's hard to slow them down."

Although none of that really explains why we played like ass on offense. But again...that's another topic entirely.

If there's any solace in such a thrashing (and there isn't), we weren't the only team that had this happen to them vs. Air Force. They also beat Stanford (road), Colorado (road), and Wake Forest (home) by 30-40 points each. They also beat Texas Tech.

Anyway. The season's over. It was a brutal draw facing the exact type of team that would beat us getting off the bus with our systemic defensive incompatability vs. them. That isn't an excuse or an attempt at placing blame. It just is what it is. 19-14 and finishing tied for 5th in the SEC is improvement vs. last year. More on that later.

See Also:
-- Air Force Schedule - KenPom.com
-- Georgia loses to USAF - ABH
-- Ground Brown - ABH

PWD

This and That on the horizon...

Almost done fishing..... (Obviously I'm not fishing. I'm back in spy school).

Over the next few weeks, we're planning on doing a recap of the basketball season(that'll run shortly after the NIT) including some suggestions/wish list going forward for the program.

We're also going to be interviewing experts (both real experts and folks who just think they are experts) on our neighboring football programs. I did several of those last year, and they were well received. So they're coming back.

I've also got a site enhancement of sorts in mind. More on that later. More posting late, late tonight.

Lady Dawgs Play at 7:00 pm. The men play at 9:00 pm. Go Dawgs.

Other updates at dawgbone.net

PWD

GONE FISHING

I forgot to tell you guys before I left. I've gone fishing. Expect more posts next week.

PWD

Playing in the Dark -- Dawgs win NIT Round 1

Both teams exited the building in total darkness as Levi Stukes and Fresno State both shot the lights out from beyond the arc. Dawgs get Air Force on the road next. More later.

See also:
-- Dawgs win shootout vs. Fresno State
-- Georgia vs. Air Force on Monday -- Time TBD

pwd

Some Dawgly Headlines

To get your morning started....
-- RV Tailgate info - Ching
-- Fresno and Georgia share more than a nickname - AJC
-- More Dawg Headlines - DawgBone.net

PWD