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4B Friday, August 31, 2007 | The Red & Black Night games ‘electric’ for players By PHILLIP KISUBIKA The Red & Black Early afternoon foot ball games mean early morning tailgates, late comers to the game and an overall malaise that takes a couple of quar ters to subside. More than anything, day games mean heat. Game time temperatures in September average at least 90 degrees Fahrenheit, and com bined with most fans’ pregame activities, it makes for an uncomfortable environ ment. But when the ball gets kicked off “under the lights,” it means some thing quite different: a national television audi ence and a palpable anticipation from both players and fans. With nationally tele- Stadium preparations ongoing, fans to arrive early for game By BRIAN MINK The Red & Black Football coaches aren’t the only ones with a game plan for Saturday night. University officials are work ing to make sure Sanford Stadium is fully operational for Saturday’s opener against Oklahoma State at the 90,000- plus seat venue. “It’s hard to simulate game day. You just don’t know what’s going to go on,” said Arthur Johnson, associate athletic director. Brown recovered, confident in return By JASON BUTT The Red & Black After last year’s sea son-ending ACL tear, it was easy for senior run ning back Thomas Brown to get down. His season had just ended when he had to watch his team lose its second straight, game in a row on the sideline not to mention watch Georgia lose to Vanderbilt for the first time since 1994. “During the first cou ple of days, of course, I was pretty down about (the injury),” Brown, said. “I was kind of thinking about the dreams I had going into that season and how they were washed away halfway through with my team mates and myself.” However, Brown wouldn’t stay down for long. Following his injury, Brown went through rehab and fully recovered before the beginning of fall camp. Head coach Mark Richt said when the Bulldogs reported to camp, it was as if Brown was never hurt to begin This weekend’s best college football games to watch Saturday, Sept. 1 12 p.m. Appalachian State at No. 5 Michigan East Carolina at No. 9 Virginia Tech Youngstown State at No. 11 Ohio State Florida International at No. 17 Penn State 12:30 p.m. Western Kentucky at No. 6 Florida 3:30 p.m. Western Michigan at No. 3 West Virginia Washington State at No. 7 Wisconsin No. 14 UCLA at Stanford Nevada at No. 20 Nebraska 6 p.m. Baylor at No. 22 TCU 6:45 p.m. Oklahoma State at No. 13 Georgia The UGA Alumni Association Presents an Event-Filled FIRST FRIDAY: 8 a.m. - Breakfast with Coach Richt (register online) 7 p.m. - Pep Rally at Tate Plaza ftrtis with tha H Special Guests Throughout the Day Include: Damon Evans. Loran Smith, Dan Maqill, * ® Matt Stinchcomb, David Jacobs, Hairy Dawg, UGA Cheerleaders, Pep Band and More! COVER STORY vised games against Oklahoma State and South Carolina sched uled to start in the eve ning, Georgia fans will have an early opportuni ty to experience football under the stars. “The atmosphere’s more electric at night. People have been waiting all day for the game,” sophomore quar terback Matthew Stafford said. Night games bring back old high school memories for many col lege players, as most of their high school games were played at night. “I personally like night games more because they remind me of Friday night football in high school under the lights,” The bulk of the work began in mid-July, with University main tenance crews servicing rest rooms and pressure washing parts of the stadium, he said. Security and other safety con cerns are also important. Johnson said staff are currently working to perfect protocol in case of a fire or other emergency. “Obviously you expect the unex pected,” he said. Johnson said nature has played its part in making prepa rations harder. “We had a real challenge (keeping the grass alive) this year with all the heat with. “There has been abso lutely no sign of an injury once camp began,” Richt said. “Some of the guys all summer long said that he was running, jumping, spinning.” With the injury out of the way, Richt has indi cated Brown will open Saturday’s game against Oklahoma State as the starting tailback. Brown, at least up to this point, has beat out senior Kregg Lumpkin and redshirt freshman Knowshon Moreno for the spot, although all three figure to see some degree of playing time. “I’ve just been think ing of putting on the pads and doing my best to stay as positive as pos sible, just thinking about getting back to doing what I did last year,” Brown said. “It’s been a long road to recovery and the main thing is just staying posi tive and keeping positive people around me. I’m just looking forward to getting back out there and playing in front of the fans.” Richt said it was hard senior running back Thomas Brown said. For some Georgia players, there is no varia tion between day games and night games. “There ain’t no differ ence, man,” senior safety Kelin Johnson said. “Morning, night, snow or rain, when the ball kicks off the tee, it’s time to play football.” Johnson went on to say that his favorite game at Georgia wasn’t at night. “When we played LSU my freshman year (a 45-16 Georgia win in 2004), it was the loudest Sanford Stadium’s ever been to me,” Johnson said. “If you were stand ing right next to me, you’d have to yell for me to hear you.” Night games are a rar ity for most college foot ball teams, and they throw a wrench in a and drought we had,” said Charley Whittemore, assistant athletic director for facilities. Whittemore said the field likely will be painted sometime today. Emphasis is put on making sure the stadium lights about 20,000 in all are functioning properly, Whittemore said, but he won’t be sure the job is done until Saturday. “We could go in and replace all of the lights Friday night, and we could walk in Saturday morning and I guarantee some of them would be burned out,” he said. to keep Brown off the field, let alone out of the starting lineup. “His work ethic is unbelievable,” Richt said. “You cannot keep him off the field. We haven’t been able to keep him out of the starting lineup we haven’t tried to either though. “You just wouldn’t have been able to predict that coming off that knee injury he’d be able to come back that strong and be that confident that fast.” “He’s number one right now on the depth chart and we’ll see what happens. He plays with a lot of energy and he prac tices with a lot of energy. You’re going to get a maximum effort every day.” Sophomore quarter back Matthew Stafford said Brown’s work ethic is an example the rest of the Bulldogs can look up to. “He works hard every day and it’s good to have him in the backfield and on the team.” Brown’s leadership will be counted on as Georgia’s season begins. “I just want to come 7 p.m. Arkansas State at No. 4 Texas North Texas at No. 8 Oklahoma Troy at No. 21 Arkansas Montana State at No. 25 Texas A&M 7:45 p.m. Kansas State at No. 18 Auburn 8 p.m. No. 15 Tennessee at No. 12 California 10:15 p.m. Idaho at No. 1 USC 12:05 a.m. Northern Colorado at No. 23 Hawaii Monday, Sept. 3 8 p.m. No. 19 Florida State at Clemson FIRST & GOAL team’s schedule, for bet ter or for worse. “At times it can be frustrating, because your emotions get jacked up on Friday and you have to wait all day Saturday for the game to start,” Brown said. “At the same time, you get the whole day to relax and visualize the game.” For coaches, the incongruity is all in the preparation. “The main difference for us (coach es) is a couple practices we’ve scheduled at game time (6:45 p.m.) this week,” head coach Mark Richt said. In the end, no matter what changes for players and coaches, it is understood what fans gain by having night games. “The fans have the whole day to drink,” Brown said. SARA GUEVARA | The Red a Black A Tailback Thomas Brown, a senior from Tucker, makes a run down the field during a full team practice Wednesday. out and give a great effort and do whatever I can to help get my team to win,” Brown said. “And hope fully we will win every game.” JjgHOfc jraV m Wt Wk - FILE | The Red a Black ▲ Senior receiver Mikey Henderson returns a punt during last year’s night game against Tennessee. Whittemore asks that fans try to arrive early and be patient if kinks arise. “We’ve done everything we can do. We have people ready to respond” if something goes wrong, he said. Danny Sniff, associate vice president for facilities planning, said transportation and parking are major issues. “Even though there’s only about 92,000 seats, there’s always between 110,000 to 150,000 people that come to Athens for the festivities,” he said. SEC remains nation’s most difficult conference The SEC has been one of the best conferenc es in college football for the last several decades. However, people still try to take shots at the conference by saying that SEC teams play easy non-conference schedules. While there may have been some truth to that sev eral years ago, the addition of the 12th game to the schedule has allowed many SEC teams to find a tough non-conference opponent. This week, Georgia faces Oklahoma State, Tennessee faces California and Auburn faces Kansas State. In later weeks, LSU faces Virginia Tech, and Alabama faces Florida State. You add on top of that all the region al non-conference rivalries with opponents such as Georgia Tech, Clemson and Florida State, the SEC becomes the conference with not only the toughest in-conference games, but also a difficult out-of-confer ence line-up. Even without competitive non-conference opponents, SEC teams have the tough est road to the national championship game out of anyone. Georgia, in any given year, plays Florida, Tennessee, Auburn, any combination of two SEC West teams and then the SEC West Champion in the Georgia Dome if they make it that far. In any given year, that’s at least three top 25 ranked teams —but usually closer to five from the SEC alone. Just about every SEC school faces a similar or worse schedule. In addition, even the less er SEC teams are improving and put up a legitimate fight each and every week. If a team can survive that Johnson said preparations for this year began when crews restored damaged concrete and replaced dysfunctional seats a few weeks after the last game of the 2006-2007 season. The stadium also was subject to a number of inspec tions, such as a health inspec tion of the concession stands, to ensure the facility’s safety, he said. “Obviously it’s a huge under taking making sure we have a clean and safe environment for our fans to come and enjoy the pageantry,” Johnson said. Marshall Duncan ▲ gauntlet of competition, then they maybe can get a chance at the natipnal championship. Auburn completed that task in 2003 and was still not invited to the National Championship game. No other conference in the nation can claim the overall competition from top to bottom. Sure, the Big Ten has Ohio State and Michigan, as well as Wisconsin and Penn State occasionally compet ing. But when was the last time Indiana, Northwestern, Minnesota or Illinois cracked the top 25? Last season, Ohio State ripped through their sched ule like they were playing pee-wee teams. The entire nation hopped on the band wagon claiming Ohio State the national champion. Then, the SEC champion Florida Gators stepped on the field and put Ohio State in their place, destroying them 41-14. While I claim no alle giance to Florida, their dom inance over a team thought to be unstoppable only strengthens the case for the SEC being the elite confer ence in the nation. So does the SEC even need a tough non-confer ence schedule to prove their status? No, but as confident and competitive teams, they welcome the competition. - Marshall Duncan is a sports writer for The Red & Black.