Welcome to the Bulldawg Illustrated Hoops Report. It’s like tripping the light fantastic because our Dawgs are dancing. All that’s left to find out is what size shoes we’re wearing. Personally, I’d love to see us in a seven. To do that, we have to beat Arkansas.That could be a tall task as I don’t know if Kenny Gaines will play, or even should play. If he says he’s ready to go, would you play him if you were Fox? We’ll let our coach figure that out. And by the way, you can say what you want about that guy, but he can coach. With all the injuries we’ve had this year, we’re still 21-10. We’ve won 20 games in back to back season for the first time since 97-98. And unless Fox has a son running a PE class we don’t know about, we’re in for the second time in his tenure and 12th in UGA history. Plus, when things looked rough last night, he pulled the right strings.

While UGA played a solid first 20 minutes, the halftime lead of seven wasn’t as big as it should’ve been. The Lamecocks hung around with solid defense. Then when the second half rolled around, we stretched the lead to 11. However, we blew two or three chances to really bury them and they all of a sudden got hot. After a 15-3 run, they took a one point lead. Then Charles Mann fell to the floor and looked like he couldn’t walk for a bit. A few minutes later, Kenny Gaines pulled himself out and ended up leaving the floor for a spell. Both later returned and UGA jumped back out front by four at the 4:00 mark and then Marcus Thornton fouled out. From that point on we outscored them 13-5 capped off by a three pointer from JJ Frazier.  The little man shot it from Broadway with no time on the shot clock and hit nothing but net. For anyone spotting the three points, it was money in the bank at that point. When we’ve played the Lamers the last three years, Michael Carrera is their X factor. When he has a big game, we lose. Last night he scored seven on 2-9 shooting as well as committing a flagrant-one foul. So keeping him under wraps generally spells victory. Plus, we shot 79% from the FT line and only had seven turnovers. Up next, pulled pork.

Just like USC-armpit, Arkansas has an X factor. You know Bobby Portis is going to get his, so we’ve got to put the clamps on Michael Qualls. We did that in Athens for 35 minutes. Unfortunately games last 40 minutes and he killed us late. If we hold him in single digits, I like our chances. It will be tough if Gaines can’t go though. Not only is he by far our best defender, he’s also our best scoring option when healthy. Even if he does go, how much can he do? While he hit three big threes last night, he only attempted five shots and they were all threes. So nothing going to the basket where he is his most effective. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens there, but we don’t have a replacement for his athletic ability.

While a lot of people moan about us losing to Auburn and USCe three times this year, those two teams are 5-1 right now in the SEC tournament. The BI Hoops report said both of those teams would be tough during the season. Anyone that actually educated themselves by watching games and not merely looking at records really knew that. And now it looks like those losses weren’t as bad as many opined. However, with Ole Miss wetting the bed Thursday, UGA now lacks a top 50 win. It would sure be nice to get a top 20 win and that opportunity presents itself around 3 p.m. today. So grab some good friends, some cold beer, and don’t forget your dancing shoes. It doesn’t matter what your dance partner looks like. Just remember, you can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig. Go Dawgs!