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Outfoxed: Hoop Dawgs Find Way to Lose (Updated With Photos)

Posted on Feb 4, 2010 by Ryan Scates  | 

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BI Photo Gallery: Georgia Falls to Arkansas

In the aftermath of Georgia’s 68-72 loss to Arkansas on Wednesday, Mark Fox stood outside the Dawgs’ locker room. With his arms crossed and eyes closed, Fox took a deep breath before heading inside to debrief his team.

Sitting at 9-11 and 1-6 in conference play, Fox finds himself with two signature wins (Georgia Tech and Tennessee) and six signature losses. (Wofford, Kentucky, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, South Caroilina and Arkansas)

Fans have been wowed by the dunks, encouraged by the bump in stat categories, and demonstrated that they are desperate to be proud of this basketball team.

With nine games remaining in 2010 (five more at home), Fox has the opportunity to give Dawgs something to cheer for, but how long the fans will hold their breath remains to be seen.

Notes From the Scene
1. Stegeman was dead tonight. Factoring in the underwhelming recruiting class, a big test week for students, and some squandered second half-losses kept the crowds from going to the trouble. The worst part was that they turned out to be justified in staying home.

2. The Athletic Board approved the much-needed renovations to Stegeman today, and that is the best news to happen to the basketball team in a long while. If Georgia wants to start attracting the massive amounts of in-state talent, we have got to make Stegeman a more fun place for the kids to play. Kentucky, Tennessee and Florida all have top-notch facilities, and Memphis even shares a home with the NBA Grizzlies. For a point of reference, the Coliseum was originally built to house livestock shows and rodeos, but once a central air system was installed they had to remove all the dirt because the air ducts were getting clogged. You can find plans for the renovations here. http://www.onlineathens.com/stories/100109/oth_499436717.shtml

3. (Ar-kan-sas) 3 syllables, makes the “to hell with” chant work better.

5. Georgia broke out the Grey/Silver Unis tonight. A good looking uniform that I hope sticks. As evidenced in the quotes below, the uniforms were not a part of any kind of motivational ploy, they were just delivered late.

6. Courtney Fortson has a name worthy of a Florida or Auburn linebacker. Just sounds right, doesn’t it? You may remember the Lil Wayne lookalike from the 2008 SEC Championship Run. Courtney got his revenge tonight with 27 points and a monster second-half effort.

7. From my halftime notes…”With a 37-22 halftime lead, Georgia ha no excuse to lose this game. A win here keeps me on the Fox bandwagon of slow, steady progress. A loss makes me question this team’s ability to win a damn game.” So, er yeah. Consider the ability questioned.

9. Only one stat matters: Georgia ranks 2nd in FG percentage 3rd in FT percentage, 1st in 3-point percentage and 2nd in assists. Georgia ranks 11th in wins (LSU is winless)

10. Coach Fox has been named is SEC’s top “twitterer”. (@coachmarkfox) His “tweet of the week” came before the South Carolina Game: “We haven’t played well on the road – & now the bus driver is asking me for directions. We’ll get it all straight. 1st step: turn on his GPS.”

12. UGA and Arkansas played for the 26th time tonight, Arkansas leads the series 16-10. The teams never met prior to SEC expansion in 1992.

13. Arkansas’ Marshawn Powell was named SEC Freshman of the Week last week. After being held scoreless in the first half he ended up flirting with a double double with 11 points and 9 rebounds.

They Said It:
Mark Fox
“Very disappointed in our defense performance…our defense is failing us. And it was failing us tine and time again in the second half.”

“He did the same thing at Ole Miss. We told our team that in the second half that he was going to come charging. He had a stronger will to get it done.“ (on Courtney Fortson)

“Our inability to get stops is crushing this team.”

Travis Leslie:
“We knew Courtney Fortson was going to come at us and I guess our defense wasn’t ready for it.”

Trey Thompkins:
(On the Grey Uniforms) “We ordered them later in the year and they came in a little late. They came in today so we had a chance to wear them tonight.”

“I know myself, I make the mistake of not playing hard on the defensive end all the time and we have to be better or we can’t win games.”

Arkansas Coach John Pelphrey
“Georgia is a really good team…Top-25 caliber”

Arkansas’ Courtney Fortson
“It didn’t surprise me that we were able to come here and pull out a victory.”

See Also:
Official UGA Release
Connor Nolte’s Gameday Trick Shot
Stegeman Renovations Approved, Evans’ Contract Extended

Tagged: uga, hoop dawgs, basketball, georgia, fox, arkansas, stegeman, renovations