Georgia Bulldogs Second Sunday Summary: Women's Tennis Rolls, Men's Golfers Remain in the Hunt
by T Kyle King on Mar 27, 2011 10:09 PM EDT
in Georgia Bulldogs News
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PrintLate last night or early this morning, depending upon how you choose to view it, I warned you that much was afoot in Bulldog Nation this Sunday. You’ve already been brought up to speed with regard to the good, the better, and the ugly, but there remain a few loose ends, which I now will attempt to tie:
- Honestly, I’m going to quit making any attempt at authoring even the most cursory recaps of Bulldog tennis matches; it’s gotten to the point where I’m tempted to keep a template on file and plug in the gender and rankings of the teams, plus the name of the SEC opponent du jour, so that each story begins, e.g., "The seventh-ranked Georgia women’s tennis team carded a 7-0 victory over 12th-ranked Arkansas." On a good day for the Gullicksons, Chelsey took her singles match 7-5, 6-2 and joined Kate Fuller in an 8-2 triumph to give the pair their ninth straight doubles win. The Bulldog lady netters now have won ten straight matches, running their records to 12-1 overall and 6-0 in SEC action.
- After one day of play at the Linger Longer Invitational, the Georgia men’s golf team stands in fourth place at three over par, seven strokes off the lead. The Bulldog linksters are led by Harris English, whose first-round 69 put him at three under par, trailing only the 64 carded by Cory Whitsett, whose Alabama Crimson Tide share the top spot on the leaderboard with Chattanooga. Action at Reynolds Plantation continues through Tuesday.
- In men’s basketball news, it was a big day for the SEC East: Tennessee hired some guy you’ve never heard of who has no NCAA Tourney berths on his resume to
replacesucceed Bruce Pearl, while John Calipari just guided a team to the Final Four. That’s sure to end well, don’t you think? Is it too early to stick an asterisk next to Kentucky’s January 29 win over Georgia? - All right, I don’t want to be a complete jerk about this, but I couldn’t let this slide:
That’s from GeorgiaDogs.com. I get that accidents happen, but not all errors are equal. When you apply for a job with the University of Georgia Athletic Association, the first question asked in your interview should be, "Spell ‘Herschel Walker.’" I mean, seriously, people!
That, my friends, is your Georgia sports Sunday in a nutshell. You may consider yourself fully briefed as you prepare to begin another work week in Bulldog Nation.
Go ‘Dawgs!
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While it wasn't a coaching hire
Georgia Tech did miss out on Chris Mooney from Richmond. That’s some good news. One of my good friends is a Spider alum, so I’m happy doubly over.
Cuonzo Martin is a good hire
and the UT fanbase is sounding a lot like ours was when Mark Fox was hired:
http://www.govolsxtra.com/news/2011/mar/27/cuonzo-martin-hired-ut-basketball-coach/?partner=RSS
Mark Fox, came from Nevada; Bruce Pearl, came from UW-Milwaukee; Billy Donovan, came from Marshall; Anthony Grant, came from VCU; Darrin Horn, came from Western Kentucky. Tubby Smith, came to Georgia from Tulsa. (Nolan Richardson went to Arkansas after coaching at Tulsa too).
Let’s see, Kentucky got John Calipari. There’s the point…the only schools that get the big-name hires from big-name programs are the basketball royalty! Kentucky, Kansas, Duke, North Carolina, UCLA, Indiana—they get coaches from programs like Georgia, Illinois, Pittsburgh, Oklahoma, et. al. Why don’t fans get this?
Back to Cuonzo Martin. He is inexperienced, but he is a “buzz” coach, a guy who was known to have all the tools and was expected to be on the fast-track quickly.
UT won’t miss a beat with him unless they get hard with sanctions.
I get that, . . .
. . . but there are degrees to this sort of thing. Tubby Smith came to Georgia after taking Tulsa to back-to-back Sweet 16s. Mark Fox took Nevada to three NCAA Tournaments, making it to the second round twice. Bruce Pearl took Wisconsin-Milwaukee to two tourneys in three years, making the Sweet 16 the year before bolting for Knoxville. Anthony Grant took Virginia Commonwealth to two NCAA Tournaments in three years, although, in retrospect, he may have been holding VCU back. Darrin Horn was fresh from a trip to the Sweet 16 with the Hilltoppers when he was hired away by the Gamecocks. Tulsa made three tourney fields in four years under Nolan Richardson. In short, the only one of the coaches you named who had not enjoyed significant success at a smaller school was Billy Donovan.
Cuonzo Martin (who may or may not be the mutant leader from “Total Recall”) has taken Missouri State to a regular-season conference title, a CBI, and an NIT. That may make him a diamond in the rough, but it doesn’t put him on the same page with the coaches you named, all of whom took lower-tier programs to NCAA Tournaments, with the sole exception of Coach Donovan. The likelihood that this is as good a hire as those others hinges upon the probability that Mike Hamilton is as adept at spotting premiere coaching talent and plucking it from relative obscurity as Jeremy Foley. I’m not holding my breath waiting for that to be proven true.
The more likely possibility is that identified by Rocky Top Talk:
With Brad Stevens and Shaka Smart in the Final Four, many UT fans will wonder why this move was made so soon and lament the program’s inability to lure one of those two, or another higher-profile coach. But given the circumstances in Knoxville with the NCAA investigation, it’s also very possible that Martin is as good as we could do right now – and it’s equally possible that Martin can win here.
(Hat tip: Team Speed Kills.)
I think it’s pretty clear that this is a step down by a desperate program. How large a step down remains to be seen.
Go 'Dawgs!
Thoughts on GT's hire?
Dayton’s coach? Label me underwhelmed.
I am bi-winning. I win not only here but also there.
Fair points...
But I suspect the UT fanbase would have been upset with anyone who wasn’t Sean Miller, Rick Pitino, etc., given that they probably expect that their program could warrant a “better” name (i.e., household) than Alabama or Georgia because of better facilities and better recent and past history.
In short, methinks they would have cried foul at anyone not from a Top 25 program (like our folks did). My point is they wouldn’t have gotten such a coach regardless of probation and/or AD.
so the big question is....
where does Pearl land? I would say Kentucky, but they are still 2 years away from Calipari leaving them with sanctions and having to forfeit this season. I’m not sure Pearl is going to be available that long.
That is an interesting question.
What makes it more interesting is the possibility of Bruce Pearl carrying a show cause penalty. It’s plausible that the NCAA may hang such a tag on him because of his repeated efforts to deceive the NCAA, but, at the end of the day, Coach Pearl’s problem was the cover-up more than the crime; Tennessee isn’t going to have to take any banners down, and other schools are going to see more smoke than fire if a guy got dinged for misleading the NCAA after taking his team to six straight NCAA Tournaments, all of which still count. Just as you can see the NCAA taking out its anger at Coach Pearl by giving him a show cause penalty, you can see a smaller school saying, “Hey, we’ll take that hit if it means making six straight tourney fields!”
You are so right about John Calipari. When Kentucky made the Final Four, I went ahead and moved Georgia’s loss to the Wildcats into the win column in my mind. Big Blue Nation made the same deal with the devil with Coach Cal that Georgia made with Jim Harrick; both times, the program went into it with its eyes wide open, understanding full well the benefits that would be derived and the consequences that would follow. Anyone who didn’t know going in that Coach Calipari, like Coach Harrick, was probation waiting to happen hadn’t followed history.
Go 'Dawgs!
Imagine this with a Kentucky logo:
(Too lazy to do it myself.)
by vineyarddawg on Mar 29, 2011 11:50 AM EDT up reply actions
That explains the basketball loss
If UGA would have just procured the REAL goaline stalker, instead of this cheap “Hershel” imposter…..
OK, I have a question
Seems like I remember a few weeks ago that most of the online brackets “gave” you the win from the “first four” games so that you didn’t have to enter by Tuesday. So I guess if you picked VCU for the final four you would have had to have actually picked “VCU/whomever VCU beat” and carried that choice all the way up?
and I agree with Kyle, all coaches from small obscure programs are not equal.
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