Perhaps never has a coach with a sub-.500 record been received with as much adulation as that of head coach Mark Fox in his first season in Athens.

NICK PARKER

That’s because Georgia hoops fans — the few who were around before Fox took over the program — were desperate for any signs of progress out of a program that floundered at the bottom of the SEC East for five of the previous six years under former head coach Dennis Felton.

With a win in Saturday’s game at LSU and a first-round win in the SEC Tournament — both of which are reasonable — Georgia will get to 15 wins on the season.

That feat was deemed nearly impossible by the media preseason, who unanimously picked Georgia last in the SEC.

A win Saturday would also lock up at least a share of fifth place in the treacherous SEC East, and taking it outright rides on Saturday’s match-up between South Carolina and Vanderbilt.
Nearly all of the offensive numbers have gone up under Fox, too.

The team’s free-throw shooting percentage is up from 63.8 last season to 71.8 this season. The field goal percentage is up 5 percent, and the Dogs are averaging five more points a game this season.

The improved offensive output in Fox’s Triangle Offense has already led to more conference wins and total wins than last season, despite playing the No. 12-toughest schedule in the country, according to kenpom.com.

But it’s not exactly as if Fox inherited a talentless group. Yes, Felton put a team together about as well as Isiah Thomas in his time as president of the New York Knicks franchise, leaving Fox with a starting backcourt consisting of a 5-foot-11 point guard, a 6-foot-1 former walk-on and two freshman backups.

But Fox also inherited two future NBA draft picks. According to NBADraft.net, sophomore forwards Trey Thompkins and Travis Leslie are the projected No. 7 and No. 8 picks, respectively, in the Web site’s 2011 mock draft.

But their play largely underscores a more important issue Fox has yet to answer in his first season: can he get players to play at Georgia out of metro-Atlanta, as Thompkins and Leslie decided to do two years ago?

This season was progress for Fox in establishing the direction of the program for recruits, but Leslie and Thompkins will eventually depart for the riches of the NBA and who will replace them remains unknown.

Will Fox be able to plug in more of the state’s top prospects or will Georgia continue to let Tennessee and Georgia Tech steal the state’s top prospects?

If Fox can, he will have officially awoken the sleeping giant and the relative success will have a snowball effect. If not, this season, which has brought Georgia basketball back onto the national landscape, will largely be all for naught.

— Nick Parker is a sports writer for The Red & Black