Back in October, Denver Post reporter Tom Kensler was kind enough to answer our questions about Georgia’s football game at Colorado. Who knew back then we’d be needing Kensler’s services again?
Colorado is interesting in speaking with Mark Richt, among others, for its vacant head coaching position, according to a story in the Post last week. (Asked about the report, Richt laughed and said, “Georgia’s my home.”)
Meanwhile, Colorado’s men’s basketball team has flown east to play Tuesday night at … drum roll, Anton … Georgia!
No word on whether Colorado athletics director Mike Bohn is on the trip with the basketball team, to perhaps kill two birds with one stone.
Kensler now has the pleasure of covering a coaching search while a season is still going on – which from my personal experience, I can assure you is death. So I really appreciate Kensler taking time to answer a few questions both about Richt and the Buffaloes basketball team.
SE: How serious does Colorado's interest in Mark Richt appear to be?
TK: Richt will be contacted if he hasn't been already, either directly or through an intermediary. I'd think if Richt wanted out of Georgia he could get another job in, say, 15 minutes. His record speaks for itself.
SE: Colorado has been facing some financial issues, and Richt has both a hefty salary (around $3 million) and buyout (a little over $5 million.) Would that rule him out, or is Colorado ready to open its wallet if things progress that far?
TK: Richt to Colorado is a longshot. He is a Nebraska native and lived for five or six years in the Denver area during grade school years. But as he has said, "Georgia is my home." I don't see him leaving UGA unless he is forced out. And the school would be crazy to do that. Perhaps he is getting tired of the pressure to compete in the SEC, but there is pressure everywhere. There will be pressure for the new Colorado coach to build the program quickly and show it belongs in the Pac-12.
Yes, Colorado is in a money crunch. Athletic director Mike Bohn said last week it would be difficult to find the funds to pay a $2 million salary. That's another reason I think it's a longshot. But from Colorado's perspective, it's worth a shot.
SE: Turning to basketball: The Buffaloes started four guards in their opener. Are they that heavily a perimeter-based team? What's new coach Tad Boyle's preferred style of play?
TK: That's not by design. The Buffs lost their top post player, 6-10 sophomore Shane Harris-Tunks, for the season with a torn ACL early in preseason camp. Although Boyle was a guard at Kansas during his playing days, he loves post play. But like most coaches, he will try to use his best five players.
The Buffs have done a 180-degree switch from last year's team under Jeff Bzdelik, who is now at Wake Forest. Although the Buffs were not a slow-down team, per se, Bzdelik did run a lot of patterns. Boyle has pushed the tempo. This team will run at every opportunity.
SE: Cory Higgins was a preseason Big 12 first team pick. What makes him so good - and do the Buffs have much to support him?
TK: Higgins, a senior and son of former NBA player Rod Higgins, is the most consistent player on the team, and he may get a shot at the NBA. But the most spectacular player and the one with the biggest upside is 6-6 guard Alec Burks, last season's Big 12 freshman of the year. CU fans had better enjoy Burks this season because he already is being mentioned as a probable first-round draft choice next summer. He is athletic and already has NBA-type size and moves.
Those two combined for 36 points per game. Beyond them, senior wing forward Marcus Relphorde (11.0) is the only double-figure scorer off last season's team.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
14 comments:
There's no way Richt leaves for Colorado! This isn't like Miami or Fla St offering him a job. Even then I would at least expect him to coach out his contract before he would consider another job.
We have got a really great coach in Richt and I hope we don't take him for granted. I know someone here will throw up some stupid stats to make Richt look bad. Fact is last year wasn't good and this year is bad. That's ten years at Ga and one bad year(this year)and one bad year by his standards(last year). Do you guys remember the years before Richt and what Ga's expectations were? Richt has set these standards that he must live up to.
We have never had a coach to produce at the levels that Richt has. Why would we assume we could fire him and find someone better? Fla hired Meyer and Bama hired Saban. Those are probably the two best coaches in the country. There is nobody like that out there coming to Ga. So we fire Richt and bring in a coach that is a step backwards for the program?
Boises coach tcu's coach, stanfords coach. Those are the coaches most talked about. I have no reason to believe that any of those coaches can be better than Richt in the SEC. They have not coached against nearly the level of competition that Richt has. Then there's Muschamp and Kirby Smart. That could really be hit or miss. First time coaches. Also there's a good chance none of those coaches would want to come to Ga anyways.
Every coach has down years. No matter how great they are. Look at Mack Brown and Urban Meyer this year. Even Nick Saban has had bad years. Richt has a higher winning percentage then Saban. Richt has earned the right to coach through a couple of seasons like this with all he has done for us.
With all that said if we have another season close to this next year Richt will be gone. I don't know what will keep Richts job next year but I think at least ten wins. I only hope if we ever do have to fire Richt we have someone lined up for the job. I don't want to see us just fire him and start asking everyone to be our coach like we did with the def coordinator position.
Oooooo, Oooooo, Oooooo Mr. Kotter, you forgot Jon Gruden.
Willb, 4 of the last 5 years have been bad. 8 am for Richt getting another year, but don't sugar coat the facts.
More Cam Newton coverage please!
I'll agree, Richt has had some great years. But he's also had more than two bad seasons.
The last two years were bad ,but you say four out of five? This year bad. Last year not as bad as this year but a down year by Ga standards.
In 08 we were preseason number one and should of been better but by no means was that a bad team. We still almost finish as a top ten team. A disappointing team but not a bad one.
In 07 we were the best team in the nation at the end of the year in my opinion. Should of been in the nat championship game.
In 06 we started the year with Joe t at qb who was not good at all and then went with a true freshman in Stafford at qb for the rest of the season. We won nine games that year and beat a very good Va Tech team in our bowl game. We finished very strong. Considering the qb situation I think nine wins was pretty good. Again not a bad team.
Again look at Ga's history. What you consider a bad season is not all that bad based on Ga's history.I understand saying this year was bad and i understand last year while not terrible was also not as good as it should of been but before that I don't think we have had a "bad" season under Richt. Maybe a couple of below expectation seasons but every school has those. Teams turn out to not be as good as we thought they were gonna be all the time.
All of the subpar seasons from Richt have came in QB transition years. His first year we win eight games in David Greene's first year. In 06 we win nine games in Stafford's first year. In 09 we win eight games in Cox's first and only year. In 2010 we win I think seven games in Murrays first year. Shockley is the only QB to come in and win but that was a little different situation then all the others.
One thing you can say about Richt is he always seems to have great QB's. From Fla St to Ga. He always seems to put out high quality QB's which is one of the reasons I think we will always have a chance to win.
Another thing look at Richts two best QB's at Ga, Greene and Stafford. There second years in the system were both great seasons for Ga. Thirteen wins by Greene and eleven wins by Stafford. Both of those teams I think were the best teams in the nation. It's just the system we are in doesn't always give you the best team as the champion in the end.
I think Murray might be better than both of them so I can't wait to see what he can do in year two. Murray is like a mix of Greene, Shockley, and Stafford. If he stays healthy he could rewrite all the record books at Ga.
Wait, nobody wants to talk about basketball? Shocking...
agree with Wilb. Murray is something to be excited about. A real competitor. I was so impressed with his scramble and completion on 3rd down that I almost forgot we lost. Bottom line, alot of our fans have mancrushes for other teams coaches who happen to be sucking right now themselves. How about this for a fan. Quit sitting around beeotching about how we dont lift weights enough and pull for your dang team. Or go find someone else to pull for. Ga has shown alot to be excited about. Everyone know UGA is a better team than the record suggests.
Mark my words (yeah, I meant to do that): Richt has at least 2 years to right the ship.
Remember the big complaints last year?
-the Defense: would it suprise you to hear that after 11 games, UGA is ranked 24th by the NCAA in total defense, up from the 60s last year? Yes, there are things that still need to be fixed, but there has been substantial improvement.
-Turnover Margin: would it surprise you that UGA has posted the 3rd largest improvement in the NCAA thus far? from -16 in 2009, to +8 this far?
-Penalities: would it surprise you to hear that UGA is seeing an improvement of 40% fewer penalities committed?
This is based off of hard statistics, and that is what McGarrity and Adams are going to look at, not the bitching by the fans on the message boards. The absolute fact that no one can honestly deny (without looking like a crazy fool) is that improvement is being made.
The only thing is that it hasn't translated to wins... yet. Eventually it can and will: that's just the nature of football.
To be honest, although I was hopeful for a surprising season out of the Dawgs, with a first year DC installing a new scheme, and a redshirt freshman starting at QB, and then the AJ Green situation (we would've won at least 2 more of those games he had to sit out, I believe), I figured this was going to be a down year. I have to say that if this improvement can be built upon next season, I don't have any problems with Richt.
The only caveat I should place on this is about the off-the-field issues. If Richt doesn't get a hold of that, it may be the 'justification' that the crazies need to call for his firing. I really hope it doesn't come to that, because I predict that we're going to undergo a RichRod/Michigan situation if we run Richt off.
Note: all the statistics came from cfbstats.com and ncaafootball.com; Unlike others, I don't make stuff up or only present those stats which support my argument. Go take a look at them yourself.
Great to see some positive attitudes.
Yes, we're 5-6, but has there been a game this season that we looked totally out of? Even against the #2 team in the nation, we come out guns blazing and are up 21-7 on them. Add in a strong presence in the middle of our D at nose tackle and Murray has more experience with his progressions and we win that game.
This year has been more about the Jimmys and Joes rather than the x's and o's. On top of the whole AJ Green thing at the beginning of this season, if:
Ealey holds onto the ball at USC
Ealey makes any amount of block on the pass rushing DE against Arkansas
Ealey holds onto the football at MSU
King holds onto the football in CU
Murray doesn't have a case of the freshmans against UF
Just a few plays and we could be sitting at 10-1 right now, looking to showdown with Auburn again in Atlanta.
Grantham has shown great improvement, all after losing our entire starting D-line and the best tackler on the team (imagine Lattimore held to 50 yards just because of Curran). I have to think after developing players and recruiting his own, he's going to be a very good coordinator.
We've scored 30+ points in the last 6 games despite not having much of a run game in a pro style offense. Let Searels do some work with the O-line and let Ealey ride some of this late season momentum into next season (hopefully without any prison time) and we can be very, very good.
The biggest thing people fail to realize is the style of football we play here at UGA is one that requires a good defense. We're suppose to be grinding clock, running the football, and scoring on 8-10+ play drives, then letting our defense come in, go 3 and out, and repeat. We haven't seen that kind of defense since BVG left, so watch Grantham come in and play right into Bobo's strength.
I think some of the best years of Mark Richt's tenure at UGA are soon to come.
Go Dawgs!
Maybe a lot of you don't care, but according to Finebaum here in AL, Fairley will not be getting suspended...
This disappoints me.
With all of these postive vibes, I can not wait for that next loss to the gators. We are 5 and 6 and could lose the tech game. Our defense gives up points and 3rd down conversions. Our OC should be a high school coach.
Next year will be worse not better than this year. If any of you ran a business like these results, you would be put out of business quickly.
Why do you hate GA so much to allow this to go on and on and on?
The failure to earn major bowl money and if people stop buying season tickes, will cause the program to earn less money. When this happens the AD will panick. We would not have been on a major network this year except for our competition.
Results matter not intentions.
I'm glad you can predict the future and can already tell we're going to be bad. Forget all the past success Richt has had, he's had 2 bad seasons now! Don't renew your season tickets, you've done your part. I, on the other hand, will continue to cheer for my team and be hopeful for the future. It's not like we've been blown out this season, and that's with a freshman QB and a brand new defensive scheme and staff.
Comparing business to college football is stupid. You can have plenty of successfully businesses, but you can only have one real successful football team a year. Barring a mental retardation in two weeks, Richt will have taken us to a bowl game every year he's been here, not quite a huge deal to everyone, but definitely not a failure. Take a look over at Texas; they'll have to be pretty lucky to make it to a bowl game this year and that's coming immediately following a NC appearance. Give us a quality defense in all 11 years of Richt's tenure and we have at least 1 NC trophy during that time.
Yes, Richt made a bad decision in keeping Willie for too long. I was calling for Willie's head before it was cool, so I'm 100% able to see the writing on the wall when it's there. I think Grantham can be the answer that we need and will get us back to playing championship caliber defense quickly.
Calling Bobo a HS coordinator is silly. He's put up 30+ points in the past 6 games and since he's "cut Murray loose," he's scored over the season average of everyone we've played since Tennessee. The man can't get out there and block for the O-line and hold onto the ball for the RBs. He's made some questionable decisions, but he's almost had to call a perfect game for us to win some of these games or people are all over him. No one can deny his ability in coaching up Aaron Murray this season though.
Take Gus Malzahn for example. How good were they last year compared to this year? You think Cam Newton might have helped him? He's now being catapulted into "best offensive coordinator ever." Don't get me wrong, the guy's good, but if he didn't have Cam and they lose some of those close games, is he the mega genius that he's been labeled? Who knows.
All I know is sitting around and thinking the sky is falling isn't going to help anything. If you want to make a statement, don't donate any money and don't buy season tickets. The man behind the curtain is going to do what's best for the program at the end of the day.
Look. I'm really sorry to disappoint you Anon@5:29, but the sad fact is that people like YOU are the ones who risk hurting the program with your unrealistic expectations and your uneducated demands. (And I don't mean you didn't go to school, I mean that you have absolutely no germane experience on the subject of college football coaching.) It's the same problem I have with all the negativity from the malcontents: you people seem to assume that somehow you know better than the professionals on how to fix the team.
Look, I quoted statistics that demonstrate that the Dawgs are improving. Feel free to go find some statistics that demonstrate differently if you can. I doubt you will find any, perhaps outside of the off-the-field incidents.
But do not ask me, or McGarrity, or Adams to listen to your 'feelings', just because 'whaaaaa-- we can't go to the SEC championship/BCS championship every year--- whaaaaaa'. That's just called 'Life'.
Were going to be worse next year? Really? Explain to me exactly why we will be worse.
Freshman QB. New defense. Those are two extremely important things whether you want to realize it or not. There not excuses, there facts! I would of liked us to of played better through it also but it didn't happen.
Also enough of this calling me and others Richt apologist! I think Richts resume speaks for itself! He does not need anyone to apologize for how he has coached at Ga through the years! Is everyone so short sighted that they only see the last two years?
Great coaches coach for many years and have seasons like this! Every damn one of them! Nobody is always going to great every single year without one mistake. You guys are expecting complete perfection. Something you will not get no matter who your coach is.
Look at Texas! They recruit the best state and have some of the best coaches but at some points they will be bad. It's a fact.
Coach Richt has not forgotten how to coach or recruit in the last couple of years. Some of you guys have to be more realistic about things. I expect greatness from us also but I know we won't always be great. I can tell when a coach is truly doing a bad job and it's time for him to go.
Ga is not a bad team this year. Fact! We could play with anybody this year. We might not win but we are good enough to play with anybody. Other teams that play us know this. Look at the stats. We are not a bad team. If we were I would be the first to say it. The record doesn't show it but this team is better than last years in my opinion.
I'm really getting tired of all these "fans" finding new ways to say there team sucks. It's ok to criticize things. I understand that. Things aren't perfect but I don't agree with how some go about it.
Maybe I'm a little too positive. That's just the way I am. I understand everyone is not going to have the same opinion as me but it's really getting to me reading all over the place where Ga fans are talking about there own team and coaches and even players like they are garbage. Things are not that bad!
Post a Comment