Mark WiedmerTwo years ago, a nationally respected college basketball television analyst was reportedly asked by University of Georgia athletic director Greg McGarity to assess the coaching skills of Mark Fox, who was about to begin his sixth season as boss of the Bulldogs.
The analyst supposedly told McGarity there were four kinds of coaches at the college level. The first was the guy who cheated whether he needed to or not. The second was the guy who cheated only when he felt it was necessary. The third was the guy who didn't want to cheat but would do it if there was no other way to keep his job. Then there was the fourth type, the guy who wouldn't break a rule even if it meant playing by the rules could send him to the unemployment line.
Fox - the analyst informed McGarity - was that fourth type, as clean as Clorox.
Nevertheless, and with a reasonable amount of justification, Fox appears to be on a very hot seat these days in Dawgville, less than two years after McGarity extended his contract to 2020. Near the close of his eighth season in Athens, Fox's overall record is a pedestrian 141-115 and his Southeastern Conference mark an even less impressive 67-67 after Saturday's tough and tortured 82-77 home loss to No. 13 Kentucky.
Nor did Fox's assessment of his team's 12th defeat of the year against 15 wins (the Bulldogs are 6-8 against Southeastern Conference competition with four games to play before the league tournament) do much to help his cause among those who want him gone.
"We've been close," he said. "I haven't been able to get them over the hump. That's on me."
But should it be? Especially if the guy who won't cut corners once more seems so close to turning the corner at a school that often appears to put men's basketball far below football and spring football and somewhat south of tennis, gymnastics and swimming on the priority meter.
You could make a strong case for Stegeman Colisum being the worst arena in the 14-team SEC, and that's after several million dollars in upgrades over the past decade. Fox's salary of $2 million a year through the 2020 season may be more than fair for a coach who's been to but two NCAA tournaments in his first seven seasons on the job, but he also has posted a winning league mark for the past three season while playing a difficult nonconference schedule every time.
And it's not like luck has been on his side, especially this season. While Georgia's inability to hold late leads against Kentucky (twice) and Florida could fall back on the coach despite a notable talent deficit against both the Wildcats and Gators, a bizarre clock malfunction at Texas A&M arguably cost him a victory there, and he might well have beaten Kentucky on Saturday if SEC player of the year candidate Yante Maten hadn't crumpled to the floor with a severe right knee sprain in that game's first two minutes.
Said winning coach John Calipari of that cruel twist of fate: "(Fox) keeps his team together. That's coaching. Not when things are going good. They do this to us (almost win) without Maten. That's what kind of coach Mark Fox is. It's about what kind of coach he is, what kind of man he is."
For $2 million a year, coaching should always be at least somewhat about wins and losses. But Fox isn't, by all accounts, just running a model program off the court. His players consistently improve under his watch, whether it be senior point guard J.J. Frazier (3.7 points per game as a freshman to 17.3 this season), junior Maten (5.0 as a freshman to 18.7 this season) or current NBA player Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (13.2 as a freshman to 18.5 his sophomore season before heading to the draft).
It is completely fair to argue that any coach at a Power Five school should be expected to reach the NCAA tournament more than twice in eight years, even at one that seems to value men's basketball as little as Georgia does.
That said, the Bulldogs seem to be built more solidly than one can remember. Regardless of whether or not Maten returns, there is legitimate depth and talent returning in William Jackson II, Juwan Parker, Pape Diatta and Mike Edwards. Let McGarity extend Fox's contract, and respectable new talent should join them.
Certainly Frazier will be hard to replace. And should Maten follow him out the door, it's almost impossible to see next season being better than this one for the Bulldogs.
But McGarity must also ask himself whom he can hire to replace Fox. Who would not only adhere as tightly to NCAA rules as the current coach but also stay in Stegeman rather than move on at the first opportunity?
It's a close call, but this is one time when the kind of man Fox is should earn him at least one more season to prove he's the kind of coach Georgia needs.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.