The Southeastern Conference handed out its coaches’ postseason honors on Tuesday and Georgia only got a taste.

Trey Thompkins made the coaches SEC all-freshman team and was the only Georgia Bulldog to get an award. That’s not really surprising since Georgia went 3-12 and fired its coach five games into the schedule. Scoring catches the eyes of postseason award voters and Georgia had the worst offense in the league so that helps explain the snub.

The coaches probably missed out on a couple of Bulldogs. Terrance Woodbury has been the heart and soul of the team this season. He’s Georgia’s leading scorer (14.0 points per game) and No. 2 rebounded (4.5 per game). He tallied a career-high 32 in Georgia’s win against Florida and 30 in a win against Kentucky. The coaches named eight players to the first team and 10 to the second team so it would have been nice to find Woodbury a spot, especially since he was a preseason second-team selection.

No basketball venue in the Southeastern Conference carries as much mystique as Kentucky’s Rupp Arena. When Georgia beat Kentucky on its home floor for just the fifth time in Bulldogs' history, you might think it would be the biggest win of the season.

But Corey Butler disagrees. Although Wednesday’s 90-85 win at Rupp was huge in a season filled with more downs than ups, it comes in a close second to a previous victory.

“It’s definitely second after beating Florida because that always feels too good for some reason,” Butler said. “It’s close, but you beat Florida anywhere in the world and that will top anything in the world. But it definitely felt good.”

Georgia beat Florida 88-86 on Valentine’s Day to snap an 11-game losing skid. No matter the sport, Georgia loves to beat Florida more than anybody else.

Unlike the Bobby Knight gossip from a month ago, the latest Georgia coaching speculation actually shows some logic.

An internet report said that Georgia athletic director Damon Evans is willing to pay $2 million a year to lure Jeff Capel from Oklahoma. At least with this rumor, the math sounds somewhat reasonable. It would probably take $2 million and maybe more to bring Capel to Athens. But landing Capel, especially with that price tag, would show that Georgia intends to become a serious player in the basketball world.

Capel is young, energetic and has impeccable credentials. In three seasons he has built a Final Four contender at a university more famous for its football than basketball in a conference that houses the defending national champion. He is the son of a college coach. He played for Mike Krzyzewski at Duke and has won everywhere he’s been, including his current position at a major university.

If Travis Leslie does not learn how to play basketball and stay in good academic standing at the same time, his Georgia career might be brief.

The Georgia coaches, academic advisors and Leslie have decided to sit the freshman guard for the balance of the season so he can concentrate on academics. Leslie has not been suspended and does not face any impending disciplinary action. But the program’s administrators think it’s in his best interest to buckle down on the books at the expense of basketball for the rest of the semester.

“He needs to be on solid ground as we go into the summer and the fall so that his future is guaranteed,” interim Georgia coach Pete Herrmann said. “He’s got to concentrate his time and his efforts on his grades at this time.”

When the team practices and goes to games, Leslie goes to study hall. He has a couple of classes that need more of his attention so he doesn’t spend the summer trying to play catch-up.

Georgia and Arkansas have taken quite a tumble since playing for the Southeastern Conference Tournament title nearly a full year ago. On Sunday the two teams hook up to fight at the bottom of the SEC standings instead of the automatic invitation to the NCAA Tournament.

Neither team bears much resemblance to last year’s squads. Only two of the 10 starters and one of the two coaches are back from last year’s title game. They are a combined 5-25 in January, including 3-23 in the SEC. Georgia has an 11-game losing skid under its belt this season, its longest since 1975. Arkansas has lost 12 of its last 13, its worst stretch since 1971.

Despite a turbulent season, Pete Herrmann hopes to return to a sideline for his 41st season of coaching. He just doesn’t know where that might be yet. Herrmann, who will be 61 in August, has been Georgia’s interim head coach since Dennis Felton’s firing in January.

“I’m looking forward to coaching for the next few years,” Herrmann said in Thursday’s SEC coaches teleconference, “I don’t feel like physically I can’t do it. I’m excited about it every day and hopefully that will happen. I don’t know if it would be possible to stay at Georgia. I don’t know where I’ll be really, but I definitely want to continue to coach.”

The odds are against Herrmann returning to Georgia next season. He was Felton’s top assistant when they arrived from Western Kentucky in 2003. But Felton’s successor will probably bring his own lead assistant and hire a different staff which won’t leave room for Herrmann or current assistants Desmond Oliver and Mike Jones.

Georgia held one of its end-of-season rites of passage before Monday’s practice when it took the team photograph to go in the SEC Tournament program.

The photograph was poignant because the 13 players posed without their coaches and man who brought them together, Dennis Felton, is no longer with the team.

Felton’s absence was striking because one of his first actions was to order a new team photo after roster moves.

Last year Georgia reshot team photos after the dismissals of Takais Brown and Mike Mercer and after Rashaad Singleton quit. This time Felton was the missing man.

Georgia will get the homecoming opponent treatment as it finishes out the regular season. Georgia will be the opponent for 100 years of basketball celebrations at Ole Miss on Saturday and next week at Arkansas. Georgia will also be the Senior Night opponent at Kentucky.

Like homecoming during football season, it’s at least a little bit of a slap in the face to be the opponent for a major celebration. Those are teams you presume to beat.

To make matters worse, Ole Miss and Arkansas scheduled its basketball century festivities well before Georgia pulled the plug on Dennis Felton and the team started limping toward the finish.

It’s been a tough season for Georgia basketball. The team barely escaped a historic losing streak. It still stands in line to log one of the worst SEC records in league history. So it’s little surprise that the Bulldogs have become the equivalent of everybody’s homecoming opponent.

As far as Georgia is concerned, breaking its 11-game losing streak could not have come against a better bunch than Florida.

With all due respect to Georgia Tech, there’s not much doubt on campus about whom the real enemy is, Florida. So knocking the Gators out of first place in the SEC East and possibly dealing a death blow to their chances of an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Georgia’s players weren’t shy about saying how much beating Florida meant to them on Saturday. Florida fans showed up in huge numbers for Saturday’s game. The Florida fans probably foresaw an easy win against last-place Georgia and they could take over Stegeman Coliseum.

Georgia instead won its first game of 2009 and silenced the Florida contingent. In the process the basketball team picked up a little revenge Urban Meyer’s extending the football blowout by calling timeouts in the final minute of their 39-point win.

When you scan through Parker Executive Search’s Website, the word “confidentiality” pops up repeatedly. Parker Executive Search takes its secrecy so seriously that it does not talk to the public. I E-mailed Parker Executive Search founder Dan Parker with an interview request. Within two-to-five minutes, one of Parker‘s representatives called with a polite, but firm, refusal and directed all inquiries to the firm’s Website.

Parker Executive Search’s blanket refusal to deal with the media seems a bit over the top. But the clandestine nature of search firms forces them to be sneaky and underhanded. They’re protecting reputations of both parties to the courtship. If they can’t maintain secrecy, they can’t do business.