CHARLOTTE, N.C.-To prepare himself for tonight's 10 p.m. tipoff against the Washington Huskies in the opening round of the NCAA men's basketball tournament, Georgia coach Mark Fox said he "forced myself to stay up late [Tuesday night] so I'll get used to it."
Said Huskies coach Lorenzo Romar, a longtime acquaintance of Fox, when he heard of this exercise in sleep deprivation: "Mark is a great guy, but he's also a no-nonsense guy. Very driven person."
The trouble with figuring out what will happen in this SEC/Pac-10 pairing is that Fox would rather drive around 69 mph (actually scoring 69 points per game), while Romar prefers life in the fast lane - 83 points a game.
"It took us dropping some games for us to really realize that you have to be able to adjust and play with a little more patience," Romar said. "We had some games earlier in the year where we just shot lights out, but I told our guys that wasn't realistic basketball. As the season has gone on, as we dropped a couple, I think they've finally begun to understand the way they need to play."
In earning a No. 10 seed after finishing 9-7 in the SEC and 21-11 overall, the Bulldogs most closely resemble Pac-10 members Southern Cal (beaten in Wednesday's play-in game) and UCLA, according to Romar, whose Huskies are 23-10 (11-7).
"USC, although I think Georgia tries to push the ball a little more than they do," Romar said. "UCLA also plays more of a deliberate style. So we've played against that in our league for sure."
Said Fox concerning Washington: "They're a very explosive offensive team. Washington has great inside scorers. Washington has good 3-point shooters. Washington has a point guard [Isaiah Thomas] that creates offense for himself and everybody else. Because they have so many offensive weapons, they can play a style and tempo that allows a lot of possessions for them to score."
None of this has been lost on the Bulldogs players. Said forward Trey Thompkins: "We don't get many games [to watch] from the Pac-10, but the ones we do catch we always notice how fast-paced they are, how everybody is getting up and down and scoring points."
A reporter asked Fox which pace he thought would win out, and whether his team might be so excited to be here that it will forget the game plan, whatever that proves to be.
"Can you ask me four minutes into the game?" he said with a grin. "As I said the other day, I'm not concerned about our players playing at 10 o'clock. I'm more worried about myself."
Because that's what no-nonsense, very driven people do.