Georgia fell Saturday to Ole Miss 85-68, but after the game the Bulldogs’ latest defeat was not the topic that most wanted to discuss.
The status of suspended assistant coach Wade Mason was first and foremost on the mind of reporters.
“It was an unfortunate situation that we’re dealing with, but it was handled correctly, and we try to keep our focus on basketball. We just didn’t play well today,” head coach Tom Crean said in his post-game press conference, before deferring all other questions about Mason and Director of Player Development Brian Fish to a statement sent out earlier Saturday by the UGA Athletic Association.
Crean was asked specifically if he saw the incident, but he declined.
“I’m just going to defer everything back to the statement after making that first comment,” Crean said. “I hope you understand, but I’m just going to leave it at that. I’ll be happy to talk about the game, but I’ll just defer everything with the situation we have to the statement.”
On Friday, it was learned that Mason was suspended following a locker room altercation with Fish.
As expected, Mason was not at Saturday’s game. Fish was at the game in his customary role on the Bulldog bench.
Junior Jaxon Etter was asked what kind of distraction the incident has been, but he wasn’t talking, either, other than to say what happened had no carry over into Saturday’s game.
“No sir. We’re basketball players first,” Etter said. “We want to play basketball first, and that’s all we are here to do.”
Crean agreed.
“We’re trying to keep our focus on basketball,” he said.
That wasn’t the case against the Rebels (13-14, 4-10). What was a close game at the half with Georgia at one time holding a three-point lead, turned ugly in the second half.
Ole Miss outscored the Bulldogs (6-21, 1-13) in the second half, building its cushion to as many as 20 points.
“We didn’t win, but it wasn’t for a lack of work, attention to detail or anything like that. We just didn’t play very well today, especially defensively in the second half,” Crean said. “Compound that with missing some close shots, which hurt us. Unfortunately, we did not defend the way we needed to defend when it came to the dribble in the first half or the next pass in the second.”
Crean did acknowledge frustration over the team’s record continues to grow.
Saturday’s defeat was Georgia’s sixth straight since beating Alabama on Jan. 25, 82-76, for its lone conference win. The Bulldogs have now lost 14 of their past 15.
“Absolutely, that’s just human nature,” Crean said. “But you come back every day, you come back with energy and come back excited. Our kids practiced extremely well. If you ever walked in and watched us practice, you wouldn’t pick the record. They come and they go.
But yeah, frustration in a game, frustration after the game, absolutely. When you lose it’s very easy to try and abstain yourself from the result or not attach yourself to the result or look for something to blame. You just have to stay together.”
Crean was asked if he ever thought going into the season that he would have just six wins heading into the final week of February.
“Of course not, you never think like that,” he said. “But you also never think you’re going to be dealing with the injuries that we dealt with early in the season. So, I don’t look at it like that. We just get ready to go every day and prepare. Even when we haven’t won, I’ve never walked into a game saying these guys didn’t prepare or work the right way to get ready to go. There hasn’t been one day like that. This is a very good group of young men.”
