Georgia gave a better account of itself compared to its first meeting with Alabama almost a month ago. But ultimately, the results were the same, as the regular-season champion Crimson Tide bounced back in the second half to post an 89-79 win on Saturday.
“The margin for error, with our lack of size and sometimes our lack of shooting, is always going to be tough,"head coach Tom Crean said after the game. "And it’s always going to get lower when you’re playing against a team like that. I’m disappointed for these guys, because of the week of work they put in. And it wasn’t just the week of work for this game—it’s a week of work to get ready for next week as well. I really wanted them to have a big win like this, but we just didn’t get it.”
The Bulldogs (14-11, 7-11) actually led for most of the first half, even building a 14-point lead with 8:03 to play.
But in the second half, Alabama (21-6, 15-2) used a 15-2 run to surge ahead before the Bulldogs managed to put together a late charge.
Down by 10 with 8:34 to go in the game, the Bulldogs whittled away Alabama's lead, climbing to within three points at 82-79 thanks to a 5-0 run on layups by Sahvir Wheeler, K.D. Johnson, and a free throw by Toumani Camara with just 1:13 to play.
But that would be as close as the Bulldogs would get as the Crimson Tide closed out the contest by scoring the game’s final seven points to finish off the win.
“It was a good game. We had good spurts and good sequences in the game. We forced them to 22 turnovers, but we also had 20. At the end of the day, it came down to one possession, it was 82-79 with a minute left and he hit a tough shot,” Wheeler said. “So, we did some things that put ourselves in that situation where we were up, and we weren’t able to sustain that lead. But also, they went up nine or 11, and we brought it back, so it was a back-and-forth game and a tough loss. We have to work on some stuff.”
Free throws would be one item.
The Bulldogs made just 13 of their 23 free throw attempts while losing the battle of the boards to the Crimson Tide, 45-32.
“Their ability to shoot the ball—and they really don’t bring anybody in off the bench that can’t shoot the ball. You have to honor those guys, with the exception of a couple of the bigger kids,” Crean said. “You have to honor those guys and be where they are, and if you can’t control the dribble, that puts you at a real disadvantage.”
Wheeler led the Bulldogs with 18 points and 10 assists, followed by Johnson with 16 points and Camara with 13 points.
“I thought Georgia really came to play. At the start of the game, they were a lot more ready than we were, so give a lot of credit to Coach Crean, his staff, and his players for coming like they did,” said Alabama coach Nate Oates, whose Crimson Tide beat Georgia in the first meeting 115-82. “I thought our guys didn’t play a particularly good 10 minutes or so. Whatever point, it was 29-15, there were eight minutes to go in the first half. I thought from that point on, we really picked it up.
Next up for the Bulldogs: the SEC Tournament in Nashville.
The Bulldogs go in as the 10th seed in the conference and will play the No. 7 seed at Bridgestone Arena on Thursday.
“We had a good game, and that’s the team that won the league [regular season], so losing by four or five (10) was much better than the game we played against them last time,” Johnson said. “So, closing that deficit, closing out the game, with the first half that we had, I think if we played like that the whole game, then I feel really good about the SEC tournament.”
