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Wednesday, February 7, 2007
These Gators are better than ever
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Forget that it represents that snooty school six hours to the south. Forget that its mascot is a repellent reptile. Focus instead on this Florida team, for it’s an aggregation for the ages. It plays basketball the way the game should be, but almost never is, played.
North Carolina might or might not have more talent. Nobody has this mesh, this comprehension, this capacity to tend to business at both ends. The Florida team that won the 2006 NCAA title was, by way of self-comparison, merely the beta version. These Gators, really the same Gators a year older, are the flawless finished product.
Remember the Illinois team that played for the 2005 national championship, how selfless and clever that bunch was? Florida is Illinois done bigger and better. Florida is Illinois with more pro prospects, more depth, more of a belief — and those Illini believed deeply — in its manifest destiny.
Florida came here Wednesday for its first real road test of the conference season, and the Gators aced it the way champions ace their midterms. Georgia gave them a hard run early, but by halftime the Bulldogs were six points down and lucky to be that close. Then they were lucky and close no more. They were worn down by a superior opponent playing at a level the Bulldogs, for all their improvements, cannot even approximate.
The Gators passed the ball willingly and adroitly a year ago, but the question coming into the new season was whether a team with five (and perhaps six) players cut from NBA cloth would be so selfless this time around. It is. Of Florida’s first 22 baskets, 13 were dunks or layups — functions of cutting and screening and feeding. Has any college team of the last 40 years put five such passers on the floor? Has any high-profile team ever cared so little about who leads it in scoring?
“The thing that makes them so special,” said Dennis Felton, the Georgia coach, “is their combination of size and athleticism and skill level.” He gave an example. In the first half the Bulldogs closed down expertly on Al Horford along the baseline, and what did Florida get out of this apparently thwarted possession? Three points.
“Their 6-10 guy makes a corner-to-corner pass to Corey Brewer for another 3,” Felton said. “You can do everything right and they either outsize you or they out-athlete you.”
The other issue, at least in theory, concerned defense. Would Florida, which never guarded anybody until Larry Shyatt signed on as an assistant, continue to defend at such a high level? The answer is no. This team defends at a higher level. The aforementioned Brewer, who’s 6-9, is the best collegiate defender since Shane Battier. Horford and Joakim Noah block so many shots that the Gators resort to double-teams only occasionally, which means they’re less susceptible to open perimeter jumpers.
This is how good Florida is: The demanding Felton, whose team had just lost by 10 points before a rare home sellout, was moved to smile afterward when he spoke of the Gators. A perfectionist can well appreciate something bordering on perfection.
Asked if he’d ever coached against a better squad, Felton said: “Absolutely not, and I’m counting my days as an assistant [at Providence in the Big East and Clemson in the exalted ACC].” He mentioned some splendid UConn teams and the North Carolina bunch with Rasheed Wallace and Jerry Stackhouse and Wake Forest with Tim Duncan, and not one of them, in Felton’s trained eye, measures up to these Gators. “They’re a special team,” he said, saying it all.
Forget that it’s Florida you’re watching, the Florida that threatens to rule the sporting world for the next century. Just pretend there are no names on the jerseys and let the excellence wash over you. If you hate this team, you’re hating great basketball. If you hate this team, you’re cheating yourself.
Permalink | Comments (29) | Categories: Final Four, Mark Bradley, UGA / SEC
Helps Jackets to be viewed as cool
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
The rarity of plaudits in February notwithstanding, we need to start with the obvious. These are kids. Maybe they get stronger. Or fatter. Maybe they mature. Or party. Maybe they open a book. Or use it as a doorstop.
This is recruiting. About the only thing with a shorter shelf life than a hot recruit is a pregame coin flip, which excites everybody for about 30 seconds, until your kick returner fumbles at the 12.
But this much can be said about what Georgia Tech did Wednesday: It excited people. That’s progress. Even if signing day is mostly about perception, perception counts for something when you’re trying to build a program and appease a fan base still irritated about the last three games and a blindside, back-door season-ticket upcharge.
Scout.com, one group of dart-throwing semi-pros, rated the Yellow Jackets’ haul of recruits as better than Georgia’s, better than almost all in the ACC, better than all except 13 programs nationally.
The seldom-effusive Chan Gailey responded as you would expect: “You don’t buy into it when you have a low-rated one, and you don’t buy into it when you have a high-rated one.”
No, you don’t. But when the same scouting service rated your previous five classes 51st, 34th, 35th, 48th and 49th — 14th says something. We don’t know what the players will amount to tomorrow. But we know the players today suddenly view this program as dangerously close to cool.
“It just seemed to me like they were changing their ways a little bit,” said Greene County quarterback Josh Nesbitt. “They were using a more mobile quarterback. They had good wide receivers. I just got a good feeling about them. Once you start going to the different schools, you see what they’re all about.”
Nesbitt has speed and a strong arm. Most major programs pursued him. In the end, it came down to an atypical final two choices.
“It was going to be Tech or Florida,” he said. So, he picked Gailey over Urban Meyer, Tech over a school that would go on to win the national title. “Yep,” Nesbitt said, with a laugh. Could he have imagined a few years ago doing that? “No way,” he said. “I would have never thought that would happen.”
Nesbitt committed to Tech in September. He didn’t waver. Other recruits also committed early, and it was difficult to find somebody who ever balked, even when Gailey was interview-hopping in the NFL.
Soon, it became clear Tech’s recruiting success wasn’t really about Gailey — which the coach could take two ways — so much as it was the program. The Jackets had elevated themselves in the eyes of high school seniors. They had become a threat in the ACC, while Miami and Florida State were on the decline. They had just produced Calvin Johnson, who was a staple on Saturday highlight shows and will be among the top few picks in the NFL draft. (Nesbitt: “As a quarterback, you see Calvin Johnson and you think, ‘I want a chance to throw to a guy like that.’ “) Also, they went to bowl games, even if seldom the most glamorous ones.
“Kids are picking Georgia Tech on the total reputation of the school and the program,” said offensive line coach Joe D’Alessandris, who came to Tech with Gailey in 2002. “Those kids see success.”
Tech has become a player for in-state recruits, signing 12. Also signed: Kell running back Jonathan Dwyer, whose other two final choices were Florida and Georgia.
One theory is there’s a deeper pool of academically qualified athletes now. But it goes beyond that. Because, while we all would like to think athletes select a school for academics, that’s just not the case. Kids want to win. Otherwise, Duke, Northwestern and Stanford would be the darlings of the BCS.
“Obviously we didn’t finish up the way we would have liked,” D’Alessandris said. “But I think just getting into the championship picture this year left an impression on the kids. They saw we were trying to get there and maybe they believed, ‘Now I can help them win it.’ “
Even in February, perception counts for something.
Permalink | Comments (73) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Tech / ACC
Filling needs means more to Bulldogs
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Athens — The power failed on the top two floors of the Butts-Mehre Building at 1:30 p.m., and immediately the wisecracks began. To cite the most obvious: Georgia reaps, by its lofty standards, a less-bountiful recruiting haul, and just like that a blackness falls over the Red & Black.
If you’re into rankings — and many folks are — Georgia did not (sorry to prolong the already-tired metaphor) shoot out the lights on signing day 2007. After three consecutive classes that were adjudged by Scout.com to have been among the nation’s top six, this one has been assessed as merely the 16th-best, behind five other SEC schools and even Georgia Tech. But here we need ask, not for the first time, do rankings matter?
“Where we’re ranked, I don’t get into that as much as whether we addressed our needs,” Mark Richt said. “And I think we did.”
Is there a gulf of talent separating a class ranked No. 4, as Georgia’s was last year, and No. 16? Richt again: “It’s probably not a very big difference. It’s what happens when [players] get [to college], whether they reach their potential. … I couldn’t tell you who [among Georgia signees] has three stars and four stars.”
Looking at the list of new Bulldogs, Richt offered this: “There are future starters here, future all-Southeastern Conference players, future All-Americans, maybe even future [national] award-winners.”
Which brings us, once again, to the greater point: As much as recruiting matters, coaching matters more. If it didn’t, Ron Zook would have lifted the national championship trophy in Glendale, Ariz., a month ago, but the demon recruiter couldn’t get his gilt-edged signees to play for him.
If coaching didn’t matter, 30 percent of the BCS slots wouldn’t have been filled this January by Louisville, Wake Forest and Boise State.
“I never wanted to have the No. 1 class,” said Vince Dooley, who won a national championship and a half-dozen SEC titles. “I wanted to be in the top 10 or 12 — that’s a pretty good class — and then go coach ‘em.”
And then Dooley trotted out a favorite line, how in 1980 “we signed the most-recruited player in the country [Herschel Walker, duh] and the least-recruited.” And how the latter, Terry Hoage, turned out OK, too.
Contrary to popular belief, nobody actually wins in February. All signing day does is give a team a chance to win over the next few autumns. Some teams avail themselves of this opportunity. Others don’t. If recruiting rankings were the determinant, Georgia would never lose to Vanderbilt and Kentucky. On the field, Georgia just did.
No matter how it may look on paper — or how, on those strange Saturdays, the Bulldogs fared against Vandy and Kentucky — Georgia has enough talent to compete for the SEC East title every single year. At issue is whether Richt and his assistants maximize resources and players play to their capabilities. In 2005 they all did. Last year they didn’t until the very end. Just because somebody decides this recruiting class was only the fourth-best in a six-team division doesn’t mean the Bulldogs can’t win that division in 2007 or 2010.
And believe it or not, some followers of recruiting — a group often derided as detached from reality — can actually grasp the bigger picture. Joe Aldridge and Bill Kramer had made their annual three-hour pilgrimage from Vidalia to Butts-Mehre for signing day, and neither seemed even slightly disappointed.
Said Aldridge: “We filled our needs [meaning linemen]. … The game is won in the trenches.”
Said Kramer: “People put too much emphasis on stars [meaning ratings], but we had a five-star athlete who became a bust. I won’t mention any names.”
Perspective among recruitniks? There might be light in the darkness after all.
Permalink | Comments (88) | Categories: Mark Bradley, UGA / SEC
Recruiting counts, but not as much as coaching
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Athens — The power failed on the top two floors of the Butts-Mehre Building at 1:30 p.m., and immediately the wisecracks began. To cite the most obvious: Georgia reaps, by its lofty standards, a less-bountiful recruiting haul, and just like that a blackness falls over the Red & Black.
If you’re into rankings — and many folks are — Georgia did not (sorry to prolong the already-tired metaphor) shoot out the lights on signing day 2007. After three consecutive classes that were adjudged by Scout.com to have been among the nation’s top six, this one has been assessed as merely the 17th-best, behind five other SEC schools and even Georgia Tech. But here we need ask, not for the first time, do rankings matter?
“Where we’re ranked, I don’t get into that as much as whether we addressed our needs,” Mark Richt said. “And I think we did.”
Is there a gulf of talent separating a class ranked No. 4, as Georgia’s was last year, and No. 17? Richt again: “It’s probably not a very big difference. It’s what happens when [players] get [to college], whether they reach their potential. … I couldn’t tell you who [among Georgia signees] has three stars and four stars.”
Looking at the list of new Bulldogs, Richt offered this: “There are future starters here, future all-Southeastern Conference players, future All-Americans, maybe even future [national] award-winners.”
Which brings us, once again, to the greater point: As much as recruiting matters, coaching matters more. If it didn’t, Ron Zook would have lifted the national championship trophy in Glendale, Ariz., a month ago, but the demon recruiter couldn’t get his gilt-edged signees to play for him.
If coaching didn’t matter, 30 percent of the BCS slots wouldn’t have been filled this January by Louisville, Wake Forest and Boise State.
“I never wanted to have the No. 1 class,” said Vince Dooley, who won a national championship and a half-dozen SEC titles. “I wanted to be in the top 10 or 12 — that’s a pretty good class — and then go coach ‘em.”
And then Dooley trotted out a favorite line, how in 1980 “we signed the most-recruited player in the country [Herschel Walker, duh] and the least-recruited.” And how the latter, Terry Hoage, turned out OK, too.
Contrary to popular belief, nobody actually wins in February. All signing day does is give a team a chance to win over the next few autumns. Some teams avail themselves of this opportunity. Others don’t. If recruiting rankings were the determinant, Georgia would never lose to Vanderbilt and Kentucky. On the field, Georgia just did.
No matter how it may look on paper — or how, on those strange Saturdays, the Bulldogs fared against Vandy and Kentucky — Georgia has enough talent to compete for the SEC East title every single year. At issue is whether Richt and his assistants maximize resources and players play to their capabilities. In 2005 they all did. Last year they didn’t until the very end. Just because somebody decides this recruiting class was only the fourth-best in a six-team division doesn’t mean the Bulldogs can’t win that division in 2007 or 2010.
And believe it or not, some followers of recruiting — a group often derided as detached from reality — can actually grasp the bigger picture. Joe Aldridge and Bill Kramer had made their annual three-hour pilgrimage from Vidalia to Butts-Mehre for signing day, and neither seemed even slightly disappointed.
Said Aldridge: “We filled our needs [meaning linemen]. … The game is won in the trenches.”
Said Kramer: “People put too much emphasis on stars [meaning ratings], but we had a five-star athlete who became a bust. I won’t mention any names.”
Perspective among recruitniks? There might be light in the darkness after all.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Categories: Mark Bradley, UGA / SEC
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