if you aren't trying for a national championship." I hear that!! We were in the Final Four 40 years ago this season. We haven't gotten that far since and have rarely even gotten to the tournament, but why not UGA? White says he's gonna recruit Atlanta really hard. The talent is here; we just gotta go get it.

"[We] like what we've done with our roster. We've got some pieces to work with, of course," White said during the UGA Athletic Association board meeting Thursday. "We're going to defend, we're going to rebound at a very, very high level. We're going to play with a high level of accountability, a high level of culture. We're going to outwork, we're going to out-prepare, we're going to out-scout, we're going to out-develop our competition."

Lol at least he can read a room and tries to win the press conference.

Nowhere to go but up. It's all there to do just this.

White will have the resources he needs to win. Now it's up to him, his staff, and, of course, the players. We have an extremely fertile recruiting ground; we just have to take advantage of it. We have IMO significantly upgraded our talent level over last season. But is it enough to win with? Remains to be seen. I am certain we will defend better. That alone should get us some more wins. Hard to say what our offense will look like. If that's improved significantly, we will win quite a bit more.

I've wanted to hire him for over eight years. If he fails, I'll take the blame. But I like our chances with him running the show.

I love Mike White as a coach. I thought Crean was a good coach as well from an Xs and Os standpoint, but obviously there were other issues that kept him from being successful. I do agree with Monkdawg that we should defend better. I was glad to hear White say that we will defend better. We have not been good defensively since Mark Fox left. I thought Fox was a good X and O coach too. The one thing I especially give him credit for is he insisted that we defend and rebound, and we did a pretty good job of that under his watch. That in itself kept us in games when we did not always have the offensive fire power or did not always protect the basketball. With all that being said, The key to success is going to be in recruiting - Especially in-state and metro Atl. He must be able to do what Fox and Crean could not do, and that is to capitalize on the rich recruiting soil in our state. Auburn recruits metro Atl like they are the in-state school. This has to be stopped. I know we can't get them all, but we must recruit/land more of the high-level talent within our state and Atl.

Right there with ya, 44. Nothing has changed in the last 8 years that would make me think White forgot how to coach.

Good points. But that is one of the reasons I give Fox credit as a coach. Slowing the game down due to the lack of talent/holes in the roster was a very appropriate strategy. The point I was trying to make is the fact that Fox did focus on defense and that focus on defense has been lacking since he left (He once intimated in an interview that of a guy is going to be a one dimensional player on his team - it better be on defense). He failed because of the lack of talent, linked to the failure to recruit effectively in-state over the course of his tenure.

Bingo. I was never impressed with our defense under Fox. Not starting the offense until seven seconds left on the clock is the only thing that kept the score down. Fox easily fooled many people that don't watch the games very closely. You can't fool old retired coaches like me and you.

gonna be fun with mike
i think we get very close to the tourney
yes the big dance

I think we can improve a lot, but I don't know whether we can get to the tourney this year. I think it depends on how efficient we are offensively. I'm sure we will be much improved defensively. We just honestly have a long way to go to get to the tourney. Not many teams go from 5-6 wins to the NCAA tourney in a season. It can be done, but it's rare.