At least he didn’t key anybody’s car.

I suppose you could argue that people in glass houses shouldn’t throw red panties, but the hell with it:

South Carolina quarterbacks coach G.A. Mangus was arrested early Tuesday morning in Greenville and charged with nuisance conduct.

At 1:31 a.m. Tuesday, two Greenville police officers in an unmarked patrol car “observed Mangus facing Main St. urinating on the street curb and roadway,” according to a report from the Greenville police department. When an officer who was called to the scene by those two officers approached Mangus, the coach was “unsteady on his feet and he had a strong odor of alcoholic beverage coming from his person,” the report stated.

On the street curb and roadway?  Damn, at least his boss has enough sense to find some trees when the moment hits.

The snark, of course, writes itself going forward.

SO NOW THE TEACHER HAS BECOME THE STUDENT #Garcia RT @FSUROCKER: USC QB coach G. A Mangus arrested last night in Greenville i've been told

— ︻╦╤─ CHILI ─╤╦︻ (@heyitschili) July 26, 2011

Someone needs to warn GA Mangus, seven more strikes and you're out of here.

— Mark Ennis (@MarkEnnis) July 26, 2011

Now if Spurrier can crack jokes about this, you’ll know he really feels good about his team’s chances this season.

****************************************************************************

UPDATE:  It’s no joking matter.

“G.A. has been suspended from all coaching activities until this matter is resolved,” Spurrier said. “We are disappointed in his actions and will handle it accordingly.”

How long was Garcia’s first suspension?  It’ll be interesting to compare.

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Do it for the ladies.

Coach Tereshinski’s training program has already paid one handsome dividend, according to Brandon Boykin:

“We do a morning run, usually on Fridays, where we run to the stadium, run through the stadium and then run back,” Boykin said. “It’s pretty nice to run with your team throughout campus. You’ve got your shirt off and girls are looking at you. Everybody wants to be seen and see the hard work they’ve put in. That’s actually something we look forward to on Friday.”

Whatever works.

Giving the people what they want

Mark Richt got a supportive reception at last night’s Bulldog Club of Metro Atlanta meeting.  Most will take that as a sign that the seat the coach sits on isn’t nearly as warm as many outside the program insist it is.  (Mark Bradley is still pinching himself over that.)  But I’m not so sure, in a way.

I’m having a hard time reconciling the coach who told the assembled multitudes at SEC Media Days that he wasn’t feeling any pressure in his job (“I don’t worry about all that. I don’t worry about the future. I worry about enjoying the ride, you know. We’re in good shape.”) with the man last night who had this to say about some of his former players:

“I’ve probably had a little less patience than I’ve had in the past,” Richt said, drawing applause. “If they’re not going to be a positive force, they need to go.”

On the same subject, the coach also said: “A couple guys left because they wanted to leave the program. A couple left because we helped them out the door.”

Can anyone ever remember Richt talking about the dearly departed like that before?  I sure can’t – and there have been a few who’ve left who probably deserved a little opprobrium from the man on their way out of town.  But that hasn’t been Richt’s style.  At least not until now.

Some will attribute that to a tougher, less patient head coach.  Maybe that’s the case, maybe not.  Emerson notes that Richt’s comments “drew kudos from the crowd”.  I don’t doubt that, judging from the many comments I’ve read and heard from the fan base over the past year expressing frustration about the apparent decline in discipline.  I also don’t doubt that Richt knew what kind of reaction he’d get from his audience by telling them that.  To me, that’s an indication that the man has been checking the program’s thermometer a little more closely than he lets on.

That’s not necessarily a terrible thing.  I think we’re about to find out what kind of coach Richt is when he’s feeling some pressure to succeed.  My hope is that if the pressure makes him better at his job than he’s been over the past couple of seasons, he doesn’t lose that edge when the winning comes back.

What is this “plan” you speak of?

This whole “we tried to tell that dude, and we’re glad he’s gone” story that Tennessee is trying its hardest to pitch to the NCAA about the Laner would be a lot more believable if (1) he’d actually lost his job over the violations that the school is desperately seeking to separate itself from and (2) Mike Hamilton didn’t have such a fine body of work indicating the exact opposite attitude while Junior wore orange.

Of course this is the NCAA we’re talking about, so it might work.

Texas, Mr. Emmert will see you now.

They’re havin’ a little get together.

The NCAA is preparing to address the storm that has arisen over Texas’ new 24-hour sports network, summoning school officials — and others with similar ventures and plans — to Indianapolis next month.

In a letter Monday to Texas athletics director DeLoss Dodds, NCAA vice president Kevin Lennon asked the school to participate in an Aug. 22 “educational summit” on school and conference network telecasts of youth sports.

Mack Brown doesn’t understand what all the fuss over the Longhorn Network is about.  It’s for the common good, people.

… Entering his 14th season as the Longhorns’ coach, he dismissed the recruiting-advantage concerns. “Those games would be games that might be on ESPN anyway,” he said. “… We’re going to sign 20-25 players a year, more 20 than 25, and those players will probably be committed to us before June in their junior year. So I don’t think that part will have any effect on recruiting at all.”

Furthermore:

“The Big 12 is full of Texas high school football players,” he said. “So if you think about it, there would be a lot more prospects from the other teams in the Big 12 on the network than the ones from Texas.”

His boss is scratching his head, too.

… The move almost assures that The Longhorn Network will launch Aug. 26 without broadcasting high school games at least at the beginning of the season. The issue has become the latest hot-button offseason item in college sports because of Texas A&M’s concern over Texas gaining a recruiting advantage.

“I’m stunned [at some of this],” said Texas AD DeLoss Dodds. “We’ve been saying the same thing from the beginning of this. We are not and will never do anything [to violate rules]. I’m a little surprised people would be concerned about us doing something.”

He’s stunned and the NCAA is its usual on-the-ball self.

… The issues are significant and confusing enough that the NCAA seemingly hasn’t been able to rule on the legality of Texas broadcasting high school games.

Anybody think this is going to end well?

… Dodds also told CBSSports.com that Notre Dame may be interested in starting its own network after speaking to ND AD Jack Swarbrick.

Nah, me neither.

Ask me about my passing game.

The face of motivation (AP photo)

It’s not nice to make Paul Johnson grumpy.

… Meanwhile, roughly 12 feet away, sat Georgia Tech’s Johnson, growing more irritable with each question concerning his program’s recent run-in with the NCAA.

Poor baby.  And the media wouldn’t stop.

… As for Johnson taking responsibility, eh, not so much.

“We just need to move on,” he said. “You can beat it to death. It is what it is. Everybody is going to have an opinion and certainly I’ve got mine, but no one asked me.”

Actually, though, his opinion was asked quite often Monday. And he didn’t appreciate it.

There was:

“We’re going to put it behind us and move forward.”

And:

“I’ve never been involved in this process before and I hope I’m never involved in another. And, really, honestly, I wasn’t involved in this one. Hardly. This one had nothing to do with the coaching staff. It was more the administrators.”

But what about the player allegations?

“Did they ever prove it [impermissible benefits]? You’d have to look at the report.”

Lessons learned?

“I take away from this that I’m going to move on. How about you?”

And when asked if it taught him anything about how to deal with players or agents, Johnson responded, “Evidently not.”

Finally, a rattled Johnson barked “next question,” and a Georgia Tech official mercifully stepped in to declare it was time for a different topic.

If this is Tech’s idea of using the sanctions as a motivational tool, it’s gonna be a long year on the Flats.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that.