Jeff Hart

The Great Motivator seems to have run out of ideas. The best Mark Richt could do for Saturday's crucial Kentucky-Georgia game was a ``red-out.'' Richt has pulled off two motivational coups in the past month, first ordering his players to get a celebration penalty against Florida, then breaking out black jerseys for last week's ``black-out'' game against Auburn.

Anthony Morrow scored 19 points to lead Georgia Tech to an 82-77 victory over Charlotte in the opening round of the Paradise Jam on Friday afternoon in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Matt Fields made a last-second layup to lead Georgia Southern to a 72-70 win over Cleveland State at the Glenn Wilkes Classic on Friday. Fields caught a short ally-oop pass from Dwayne Foreman to put in the game-winner with .01 on the clock.

Atlanta Falcons coach Bobby Petrino declined to say Friday whether Byron Leftwich or Joey Harrington will start at quarterback against Tampa Bay.

Jimmie Johnson is determined to do everything right this week. The reigning Cup champion, who holds an 86-point lead over Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon heading into the season-ending Ford 400, got off to a great start Friday at Homestead-Miami Speedway, winning his fourth pole of the season and the 13th of his career.

Nearly a dozen northeast Georgia football teams will begin their quest for state titles Friday night in the first round of the playoffs in every classification. Here is a capsule look at some of the biggest matchups in the area:

The North Hall and McNair football teams should know a little bit about each other when they meet Friday night in the opening round of the Class AAA playoffs at The Brickyard. The two teams' met last year with the Trojans coming away with a 43-26 win in the second round.

Despite being just five years old Flowery Branch will have a distinct advantage when it comes to playoff football. The Falcons play host to Chamblee in the first round of the Class AAA football playoffs Friday night.

The Habersham Central football team will find out very quickly if it is a pretender or a contender for the Class AAAA state title this year. The Raiders (9-1, No. 2 seed from 8-AAAA) open the first round of the playoffs at home against last year's state runner-up Marist.

Stay-Rod? In a startling turn of events, Alex Rodriguez spoke with the Steinbrenner family and New York Yankees officials Wednesday and told them he wants to stay in pinstripes. His longtime agent, Scott Boras, wasn't involved in the talks.