As January winds down to its inevitable conclusion, we find ourselves on the verge of the first full calendar month without football. (Oh, all right, I guess they still play that pro game that gets sandwiched in between the advertisements and the halftime show, but even devoted playoff advocates know what a farce this Super Bowl is.)
Former Ole Miss quarterback . . .
. . . against former Michigan quarterback? Sounds like more Big Ten-S.E.C. feuding to me!
Consequently, we must steel our resolve and prepare to cope with the reality that, yes, there is more to life than college football season. There are, for instance, other college sports and college football-related offseason happenings; viz.:
- You know this already, of course, but the early reports have been confirmed: John Lilly has been introduced officially as Georgia's tight ends coach. We now formally welcome Coach Lilly to Bulldog Nation.
- Georgia gymnastics rocks . . . and, fortunately, folks are starting to take notice. Seriously, if you're a single guy enrolled as a student at the university, you have five home meets left. A gymnastics meet makes a great date event.
Hear me now and believe me later.
- Tennis season is in full swing. The second-ranked men's team, which entered the winter with a 62-1 record over the last two seasons, began team play in Tulsa this weekend, defeating Stanford 7-0 on Saturday and registering a 7-0 victory over the host Golden Hurricane on Sunday. The fifth-ranked women's team opened the campaign with a 7-0 home win over East Tennessee State and followed that up with a 6-1 victory against South Florida.
- Bulldog Nation faces a moral dilemma and your thoughts on how to address it are most welcome.
By the way, I meant this kind of screwdriver!
- What promises to be a significant 2008 season for the Diamond Dogs will get underway on February 22. (College baseball has a uniform start date this year, requiring Southern teams to delay the starts of their seasons because it's totally our fault that people in other parts of the country didn't have sense enough to establish their universities in locales with hospitable climates.) The Red and Black will face significant challenges, tangling with top-ranked Arizona, the Atlanta Braves, and two-time defending national champion Oregon State straight out of the gate, but the Bulldogs will begin their slate as the No. 24 team in the country.
- Finally, for what it's worth, today marks a pair of noteworthy anniversaries in University of Georgia history. On this date in 1785, the Georgia General Assembly became the first state legislature in the United States to charter a state university. On this date in 1995, my wife, Susan, and I went out on our first date.
Go 'Dawgs!