ATLANTA – Georgia overcame a sloppy start in the in-state rivalry game to beat Georgia Tech 60-43 at McCamish Pavilion on Tuesday.
Below are five things we learned in the Bulldogs’ victory.
1) Maten uncharacteristically slow to start – Georgia forward Yante Maten has been the Bulldogs’ best player thus far, and has even carried the team at times. Having two performances of 30 points or more this season have showed that, however that wasn’t the case against Georgia Tech, at least early on.
The Yellow Jackets keyed in on Georgia’s star, varietizing their defensive schemes with 1-3-1 zone in addition to triangle-and-two zone. As a result, Maten only had five points on 1-for-5 shooting at the intermission before having a more successful final period, finishing with 16 total points. However, the bout of struggle gives Maten an idea as to how opponents can slow him down and adjust when conference play begins in a week.
2) Harris provides early spark – Freshman Jordan Harris earned his third consecutive start and had a significant impact early, sinking two 3-pointers. In what was a turnover fest for the first 20 minutes, as the teams combined for 18, Harris’ production was needed. As a result, the freshman earned a season-high 29 minutes.
In terms of first-half scoring production, Harris was joined by sophomore Derek Ogbeide who started the night with 10 points and seven rebounds on 5-of-5 shooting.
3) Bulldogs stymie Georgia Tech – The Yellow Jackets truly showed their inexperience on Tuesday, and it’s quite a daunting task for newly-hired head coach Josh Pastner to enter the job with nearly no returning starters. Georgia Tech shot only 35 percent from the field and Georgia forced 16 turnovers.
The Bulldogs had their best defensive performance of the year, limiting the opposition to 43 points. While Mark Fox was pleased, he credited the numerous miscues on each end to the nerves surrounding an important rivalry game.
4) Georgia handily outrebounds Georgia Tech – Mark Fox made rebounding a focus after getting neat against Marquette two weeks ago, and Georgia has outrebounded its opposition in each game since, including Tuesday night.
Georgia only shot 37 percent on the night, having nearly as ugly of a game as Georgia Tech, however the dominance on the glass allowed the team to pull away. Georgia outrebounded Georgia Tech by a 40-31 margin, including 13-5 on the offensive end. The performance shows once again that a lot of the rebounding success is effort-based and the Bulldogs will look for it to continue.
5) Georgia’s large margin of victory due to missed layups by Georgia Tech – Let’s be real here, this game was far from pretty on either end, with both teams shooting around 35 percent and a combined 4-of-28 from deep. The only reason that Georgia Tech looked more “sloppy” was the numerous missed layups.
The Yellow Jackets had a leading scorer, Quinton Stephens, finish 0-for-9 shooting and center Ben Lammers finish 4-for-10, a lot of those misses inside the paint. The margin of victory on Tuesday could’ve been a lot closer than 17 and Pastner knows it.
“We missed layups, we had a lot of layups,” Pastner said. “It just makes it hard, we can sit here and over-analyze it, but there’s not a lot to do on that. Based on our roster, when Quinton (Stephens) goes 0-for-9 and Tadric (Jackson) goes 2-for-5, it’ll be hard unless you’re playing an awful opponent, and we don’t have any of those left.”
