Until Georgia finds some offensive consistency, the Bulldogs will need to lean on their defense to find success.
Monday night against Saint Joseph’s in the semifinals of the Greenlight Sunshine Slam, that’s exactly what happened.
The Bulldogs (4-1) used what head coach Mike White deemed his team’s best defensive half of basketball this year to ease past Saint Joseph’s 66-53 and into Tuesday’s championship game.
Georgia will play UAB in the finals. Tip-off at the Ocean Center in Daytona Beach, Florida, is set for 4 p.m.
“Energy, urgency, communication. Those facets of defense are just so important,” White said. “I know they can be cliché, but they are the difference between a really good defense and an average defense. I thought we were on point in the first 20. It was as well as we’ve defended.”
The statistics backed up White’s point.
Saint Joseph’s (2-2) shot just 21 percent in the first half and just 15 points. The 15 points were the fewest allowed by the Bulldogs since allowing just 12 to Kansas State on New Year’s Eve in 2014.
“This was one of the better offensive efficiency teams, early, in college basketball. So, the overall look at it was pretty good,” White said. “We’re further ahead defensively, of course, than we are offensively, but certainly in the first 20, that’s probably our best version to this point in the season.”
Kario Oquendo returned to action after not playing against Bucknell with a sore knee to score a team-high 15 points.
He was followed by Terry Roberts, Justin Hill, and Jabri Abdur-Rahim with 12 each. Abdur-Rahim and Hill both had a trio of three-pointers.
“He’s such a quiet guy, he’s such a laid-back guy, he doesn’t make it a lot about him. He’s been consistent with just showing up and working,” White said of Oquendo. “He got more reps here the last couple of days. I felt he would probably go. I found out before the game that he would give it a go, and he was good, man. He had some timely baskets in the second half and/or fouls drawn that put pressure on the defense. In space, he’s got to be one of the harder guys to keep out of the paint.”
But despite leading 38-15 at the half, Saint Joseph’s managed to rally back. The Hawks got as close as eight points late in the game, but Georgia was never in any danger of losing the lead despite scoring just three points in the first 9:05 of the second half.
White said the message to his team during the drought was simple.
“You just stay the course defensively. It’s easy to control. We’re always going to give that message,” White said. “Obviously, if you get a big dunk, you get a big in-one, you get an open three, it’s easier to get your juices flowing, to sprint back and feel good about yourself and have a little bit more pep in their steps. But championship level teams, the best defensive teams, they control what they can control whether the ball goes in or not.”
That’s a lesson White feels his team is beginning to learn.
“This team is growing in that regard as we continue to develop offensively. We missed some, and we had a little lack of execution,” White said. “Credit Saint Joe’s. I thought they came out in the second half and increased their ball pressure. I’m not sure they had us rattled, but they had us sped up. They had us not executing as crisply as we were in the first half. We’ve got to look as a staff and see what we can do a little better offensively.”
NOTE: Jaxon Etter did not play in Monday’s name but White said it was not a pre-meditated move. “I was really surprised, honestly. He’s healthy, he’s a big part of what we do. It’s just hard to play 11 or 12,” White said. “It was late in the first half, and we were playing as well as we played in any game practice this year. It was a case of if it’s not broken why fix it? It definitely was not a pre-mediated decision. Heck, he might play 25 minutes (Tuesday), I don’t know.”
