Larry Munson, the voice of Georgia Bulldogs football since 1966, is “50-50″ as to whether he will be announcing on Saturdays this fall.

This is quite a shocker for those in the Bulldog Nation. We all knew Munson’s time was coming to an end, but no one wants to see it happen. Hopefully Larry will be back for at least one more season between the hedges.

Hat tip: Paul Westerdawg.

Today’s biggest stories:

• RIAA sues UGA students (registration required) - The recording industry trade group has filed suits against 15 anonymous UGA students for illegal music downloading. RIAA hopes to get UGA to release the students’ names.
• Ticket pick-up process changes - Now students will pick up tickets (football, b-ball, and Gymdogs) by their total hours. Pick-ups will also be between 5pm and 9pm to minimize class disruption.
• ACC commissioners claim ignorance, still want to change alcohol policies (registration required) - Commissioners Dodson and Lynn claim to be upset about not previously hearing of possible alcohol policy changes, but they still want to make the suggested changes (makes a lot of sense).
• UGA Police like to stop UGA buses - The Athens World blog tells of UGA police and their propensity to stop UGA Transit buses for minor offenses, often causing traffic backups.
• 35-1 for national championship - An AJC sports looked up the odds of UGA football (and others) winning the national championship.
• Sean Bailey loves pit bulls (registration required) - UGA wide receiver defends the raising of pit bulls, as long as it isn’t for fighting (a la Michael Vick).
• UGA has SEC scholar athlete - UGA runner Natalie Picchetti was named one of the SEC’s two Scholar Athletes of the Year.
• R&B rips Barnes - My favorite read of the morning, the Red and Black Editorial Board rips into Blake Barnes.  The best (or worst) quotes:
  • If a third-string quarterback gets suspended and nobody cares, is he really suspended?
  • But with him out, who is going to hold the clipboard?
  • Maybe the coaches should use football analogies to explain it to the players. For example: walking down the street with open containers is like throwing a pass into triple coverage…  But then again, Barnes would actually have to play for the analogy to ever make sense.

Today’s big list of updates:

• Public university students all over Georgia will have to take the Regents’ Exam earlier (ABH & Gwinnett Daily Post).   Instead of being able to take the test anytime before students receive 45 hours, now they will have to take it before or right after they begin their freshman fall semester.
• Vehicles broken into at Lodge of Athens (ABH).
• The conflict study we reported on Monday is making big waves, and is featured on Slashdot.
• AJC interview with football recruit Jonathon Owens.
• Georgia ranked as preseason #14 in football (AJC).
• AJC blog discusses football suspensions.
• Another AJC blog reminisces on the old days of Georgia football.

Here ya go:

• Someone rags on the new UGAAlert system recently announced.
• The Freakonomics blog hints that the new student athlete policies at UGA are improving attendance and grades.
• SPIA prof studies world conflicts.
• David Ching determines who will play for Tripp Chandler and discusses the implications of his arrest.

And my favorite quote of the day is from Paul Westerdawg, on yesterday’s arrests of Tripp Chandler and Blake Barnes:

That said…what sort of dipshit walks down Lumpkin Street at 3:00 am with an open beer? That’s a freshman move. Academic seniors (redshirt juniors) like Barnes should know that the Athens and UGA cops live for the open container arrest.

This morning UGA’s third-string quarterback Blake Barnes and tight end Tripp Chandler were arrested for alcohol-related offenses. Barnes was jailed for open container and supplying alcohol to a minor (Chandler) and Chandler was busted for open container and underage possession.

The boys were arrested at 2077 South Lumpkin with brews in their hands.

The ACC jail report is here.

See more here (R&B) and here (ABH).

Both will miss some games (at least 10% of the season). The loss of Chandler is a major hit, as he was set to be the starting tight end for the Bulldogs this fall.

The punishment for both will most likely be decided tomorrow, as Coach Richt is out of town until tomorrow.

Check back here for more updates on the situation.

*UPDATE*

Coverage is increasing.  See the AJC, DawgSports, Rivals.com, and Scout.com.

There has been a lot of UGA sports news this week, and we’re gonna try to hit all of it in one big pass.

• Georgia football has gained their 12th (DE Toby Jackson), 13th (DE Jeremy Longo), and 14th (OL Jonathan Owens) commitments for 2008.
• The ABH (registration required) has a nice little article about Matt Stafford.
• ESPN and Georgia Sports discussed Georgia’s stringent academic policies.
• Men’s basketball has scheduled to play in a Hawaii tournament this fall.
• 248 UGA athletes had a 3.0 or higher spring semester, including 26 football players.
• Men’s baseball players did reasonably well in the draft. Dodson and Troupe will likely remain around for another year despite being drafted (this is allowed in the MLB).
• Georgia did very well at the NCAA Track and Field Championships, finishing in the top-10 with 7 becoming All-Americans.
• Former Bulldog Odell Thurmond was arrested for assault and then the charges were dropped.

And lastly, according to the Shreveport Times, apparently Alabama coach Nick Saban had some words for Mark Richt at the SEC Conference:

But then Saban walked by, gave a friendly hello and told Richt he had recently been in an Athens, Ga., nightclub to watch his son Nicholas Saban’s band play and said he noticed a lot of Georgia’s football players at the club.

Richt was obviously taken aback by the comments. Was Saban kidding? Does Saban, who spends a lot of off time in north Georgia on Lake Burton, realize that Richt just lost Parade All-American, redshirt freshman linebacker Akeem Hebron? Hebron just transferred after being suspended for two semesters following a pair of recent alcohol-related arrests.

Richt had no comment, but witnesses said he did not appear cordial and seemed angry.

Email from UGA about the new UGA Alert System:

TO:  UGA Faculty, Staff and Students on campus for summer 2007

The University of Georgia is pleased to offer a new emergency notification system to faculty, staff and students. Although university campuses are usually safe places, emergencies and disasters do occur. Because UGA is committed to keeping you as safe as possible, we are providing UGAAlert to alert you in the event of an emergency. UGAAlert is a voluntary program that will be used only in the event of a real emergency and may be useful when users may not have access to other means of communication. During this phased rollout, users will logon to the registration page (www.ugaalert.uga.edu) and enter up to three telephone numbers and two email addresses to receive emergency alerts. Users must have a valid UGA MyID to register. At this time, we are asking only students, faculty and staff who are on campus during Summer 2007 to register. Continued registration will be in effect through Fall 2007 as others return to campus. All messages from UGAAlert should be taken seriously be!
ca!
!
use the system will be used ONLY in the event of a real emergency when time is of the essence. To register or see a list of frequently asked questions, log on to www.ugaalert.uga.edu.

The poor formatting is UGA, and not mine.

The suspect that UGA Police were looking for yesterday has been apprehended, according to an email sent to the Archnews listserv:

TO: University Community

FROM: UGA Police

Based on a tip from an alert UGA employee, UGA Police today apprehended Letorris McDuffie, for whom a lookout had been issued yesterday. He faces multiple charges for recent thefts on the UGA campus. McDuffie is not currently an employee of or associated with Martin Mechanical, Inc. The University of Georgia Police Department thanks those in our community who provided information related to this individual. Anyone with additional information related to these thefts or others is urged to call UGA Police at 706-542-2200.

After the lack of news the past couple of days, there are a few stories to report on.

• There is no update as of yet about the warning the UGA Police sent out yesterday.  A look of the arrest logs of UGA provide no clues as well.
• As previously reported, UGA has been approved to take control of the Navy Supply Corps School grounds, where a medical school will be built.  Also see the coverage of Peach Pundit, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, and the Athens Banner-Herald.
• Cocktails at the Georgia Center (registration required) - The Georgia Center is expanding its bar, adding a cocktail lounge.  The article says they hope to have the expansion finished by football season.  Apparently they don’t want to miss out on all that business.
• Improving campus (registration required) - Administrators and students have come up with a list of “campus beautification” projects.
• Parking rates might go up (registration required) - A consultant is telling the Athens-Clarke County government to raise downtown parking rates and the parking ticket fines.  It seems ACC always works on this kind of stuff during the summer, when students aren’t around.  I wonder why…

And a follow-up on a post from last week: Last week there was an editorial by Bill Shipp printed in the Gwinnett Daily Post that blasted UGA and University Housing.  Today, the Post printed a response by UGA Vice President Tom Jackson.  It’s good reading.

UGA Police emailed this alert to the Archnews listserv (to students, faculty, and staff) just after noon today:

To the University of Georgia Community,

The University of Georgia Police Department would like to notify the University community of an individual we are currently attempting to apprehend.  The individual is a black male who is 5’6” in height and weighs approximately 185 LBS.  He normally wears blue work pants with a blue on blue striped shirt with a patch which says “Martin Mechanical Contractors INC.”  Another patch on his shirt displays the name “Letorris.”  He has also been seen wearing a yellow shirt with green pants.  This individual has committed multiple thefts on campus and has active warrants for his arrest.  If he is on the University campus, then he is likely here to commit another theft.  If you see this person please contact the University of Georgia Police at 706-542-2200 as soon as possible and do not confront him.

We will have more details as they become available.

Note: this has also been posted on the UGA Police News and Timely Warnings site (RSS feed here) but it might require a page reload to see the post.