Mark Richt should be shopping for Mark Fox

With Christmas just days away, perhaps Mark Richt should head out to the Mall of Georgia or the University of Georgia bookstore and invest in a gift for Georgia basketball coach Mark Fox. Why get a present for the basketball coach, you might ask? Well perhaps because he is taking some attention away from Richt and the Dawgs’ appearance in another lower-tier bowl game. The basketball team could make the NCAA tournament this season, and in addition to quelling some alumni displeasure in the athletic department’s lack of overall success in recent year, that could help Richt land a few recruits on National Signing Day.

If Georgia is in the running for a top-flight talent and is up against Alabama or Auburn, perhaps the edge might go to Georgia due to the success of the basketball team. Some of the best recruiting classes Richt hauled in came in his time that coincided with Jim Harrick’s final two years on campus.

Plus you cannot discount that the athletes on campus have the pride of wanting to better their fellow students’ teams. The football team doesn’t want to hear that the basketball team is doing better than them; the basketball team meanwhile wants to break out of the shadow of the football team. The ongoing competition is good for both programs and the friendly rivalries have helped Florida and Texas in recent years.

Finally, though he may not want to admit it, Richt has gotten at least one player this season due strictly to the basketball program. Nick Marshall of Wilcox County is a standout quarterback and cornerback but also stars on his high school team’s basketball squad. The shooting guard will walk-on the basketball team in Athens while playing football on scholarship. Marhsall could have committed to a number of other schools to play both sports but decided to go to Georgia to engage in the double-dip. Walter Hill was another player several years back that came to Georgia to play both because of the basketball program. And early on in Richt’s tenure, Fred Gibson moonlighted as a basketball player after catching footballs in record numbers.

Richt might be the basketball team’s biggest fan this season as a way of saying thank you as some of the intense spotlight moves off of him for a few months. He might need to be careful at the end of the day though. The Georgia basketball program seems to be on the way up and could be there for a while. Some in the Bulldog Nation might soon start to gripe and wonder why the football team cannot join in the “program climb.” Richt should be happy that there is a distraction now and hope he can regain top status in Athens soon.