Was a little surprised at the groaning directed at Coach Fox about the hardwood loss the other night. Surprised that the honeymoon is over so quick...and surprised that we've built ourselves so quickly into a fanbase that expects basketball wins so quickly.
Don't get me wrong, I think both are good. As true Dawgs we should expect to win every game, and that's a feeling that hasn't come frequently in relation to men's basketball.
That being said, if you are yet to be completely sold on Coach Mark Fox you have certainly reached for the wallet. If not, I question your sanity. Why? Just take a look at the recruits that are entertaining him and his staff in their own living rooms. Felton wouldn't have made it past Marcus Thornton's mailbox last spring. Fox is sitting on the same cushions as the likes of Matta, Calhoun, Williams, Pitino, Calipari and Mike friggin' Krzyzewski.
Fletcher Page ran a piece the other day on Miller Grove's Tony Parker. He's a 6'9" 265 lb stud who loves the game of basketball and has helped his team to two state championships. He described himself to Page as "wide open" in terms of recruiting. Normally these caliber state kids aren't considering the Athens zip codes even when they're this wide open.
While Parker is a national recruit, he has spent time visiting home state schools. He took a trip to Athens to see Georgia knock off Kentucky Jan. 8.
“It was good. I liked it. It was nice,” Parker said. “They had a good matchup with Kentucky. They played really hard and got a good win… I’ve been knowing Georgia since (former head coach Dennis) Felton.”
Felton actually offered Parker while he was still just an eighth grader. Once Mark Fox took over in 2009, he let Parker know he was a top target.
“He’s a real good coach,” Parker said of Fox. “He’s cool. He’s making his program known, and that’s good for Georgia.”
When Parker narrows his list down this Fall, if Georgia is still on it I'll admit that I'd be shocked. But only because this is unfamiliar territory for me as a UGA hoops fan. Sure, we've recruited and signed kids like Parker before. But if it becomes a habitual occurrence, we'll know he's doing more than wiping his feet off at the door.
And now for something much more trivial...
#ThursdaysRTrivial is coming up right after this PSA: We interrupt this hiatus and take you back to your regularly scheduled awesomeness.
#ThursdaysRTrivial episode 65 "Tony Parker's Living Room". We're back! And we're just as bad as ever. It's the weekly Twivia Show that crawls through those tangly interwebs just to clog up your Twitter Feed. REPLY back your answer for a chance at a fabulous prize! Tony Parker is a star at Miller Grove HS and a big in state target for Coach Mark Fox. What team did Georgia play at Stegeman during Parker's last visit to Athens?
A Twitter trivia show can evidently go on hiatus, but that doesn't mean that Shan's trivial knowledge and ability to make Google bow to his supremacy takes a break. Even when the Twitlonger servers buckled at the weight of #ThursdaysRTrivial's url requests, he powered through and came back with the winning answer: Kentucky. He takes home the Parker family's old remote found under a seat cushion, so now he doesn't have to even stand up to change the channel, much less walk twenty feet to turn the dial. Ally was close and had the right answer, so she gets one of those sofa arm rest cover thingies. The Parkers tell me the stain is not from Pitino, so enjoy!
Last but not least, Mike and Blake both chimed in with Missy State. That might sound bizarro, but an educated guess is better than none at all. So you both get the loose change that fell out of Calipari's pocket into Mr. Parker's La-Z-Boy. I think there's enough there to buy a blue-chipper!
And before we leave episode 65, I did some digging into the #ThursdaysRTrivial archives with the intention of finding the top three episodes pre-hiatus. I was mostly successful and wanted to share.
3. At number 3 is one of my personal favorites. Frequent BDB commenter Olllddude happened to have family ties near a spot we used as a spring vacation last year, St. Augustine. With the help of modern technological devices and navigation systems we were able to do a drive by tourist style and snap a pic. It reminded me of my grandmother's old house. Plus, I love a good pirate story involving treasure. Scott grabbed the top prize.
2. The second most impressive answer comes from none other than Kit Kitchens. I can't find the post, but I found myself in traffic around the Atlanta airport one Thursday early in the series. So for episode 4 I snapped a picture of a sign outside of the west terminal as I dropped the wife off for some girls' trip. Unbelievably, LudaKit recognized it rather easily.
1. And the most impressive answer in the series came in episode 5. I would have to say I made this one pretty difficult to find, as close to google proof as I've been able to manage. Yet, John not only proved to be a reader of Jeff Owens' blog back when #95 was still on campus, but also remembered from a post there that Clint Boling's favorite dessert was Mama's Apple Pie. It's also one of the most calorie rich episodes we'll likely ever have.
Stay tuned in for next week's episode when we cast a shadow on a groundhog!
