WHEN: Wednesday, 7 p.m.

WHERE: Stegeman Coliseum

RECORDS: Georgia 10-0, 0-2; Tennessee 10-5, 2-1

TV/RADIO: ESPNU (Kevin Fitzgerald, Fran Franschilla); Georgia Bulldog Radio Network (Scott Howard, Chuck Dowdle, Adam Gillespie); XM/Internet (385/975)

In the 1993 movie Groundhog Day, comedian Bill Murray played a cynical weatherman who finds himself reliving the same day over and over again.

It’s that sort of scenario that Georgia basketball coach Tom Crean is doing his best to help his young Bulldogs avoid, especially since embarking on the SEC portion of their schedule. It continues Wednesday night against visiting Tennessee (7 p.m., ESPNU).

“I think when you've done this a long time, you know what improvement looks like even when they don’t. The days run together for players, especially young players, and it becomes Groundhog Day,” Crean said. “But it's not for coaches, and it can't be. If it's Groundhog Day for coaches, that's a problem, right? You have to get players out of that. That's what you have to make sure you don't let happen.”

It’s been a tough week for Georgia (10-5, 0-2), which upset previously No. 9 Memphis two weeks ago before dropping back-to-back games to Kentucky and Auburn to open conference play.

Although the Bulldogs had isolated moments in both games, frustration kept setting in. One of Crean’s early challenges is to make sure his freshman-dominated squad doesn’t get stuck in a rut of going through the motions without enjoying some sort of fruit for their labor.

“In January, in February, you've got to work through that, and that's why keeping creativity up is important,” he said. “Monday, probably the first 15 minutes of our practice was spent just on shooting and driving the ball, building the offense; it wasn't scrimmaging.”

The reason, Crean said, is simple.

“We have to keep building their confidence, because no matter what we do defensively, no matter what we do rebounding the ball, no matter what our players are different than—then the majority of other players get a dose of energy. We see that ball go through the basket,” Crean said. “It's a rare player that can play at the highest of levels when they're not scoring, or the shots aren't going through for them right. That's college basketball. How quick you get over disappointment, and keep it from turning into discouragement—that's the key to your growth.

“We’ve got to keep making sure that every day we're opening up the growth plates of this team. “

Saturday’s 82-60 loss at the hands of No. 4 Auburn was definitely a lesson.

In the game, Georgia actually got off to a solid start and actually lead the unbeaten Tigers early in the game before poor shooting, turnovers and more trouble on the boards quickly ruined what brief thoughts the Bulldogs had of pulling the upset.

“It was two big losses, but at the end of the day it was two very good teams,” freshman Toumani Camara said. “We learned from it and are going to come back from it.”

Junior Rayshaun Hammonds certainly hopes so.

“The first two games we played against the two best teams in the SEC as of right now, and they see how it is,” he said. “From the top to the bottom of the SEC everyone’s going to play hard. You’ve just got to be ready for it.”

Georgia will certainly have to be prepared for the visiting Vols (10-5, 2-1), who come in off back-to-back victories over Missouri (69-59) and South Carolina (56-55).

“They live on the glass. Auburn lived on the glass. Kentucky lives on the glass. We have to learn how to live on the glass, and we've got to learn to be able to do the same thing,” Crean said. “So, to me, the bottom line is our level of improvement has got to stay up. We had a really good day that yesterday. We just have to continue to make sure that our improvement leads to confidence because there's no time to get sad and distracted because you have to keep getting better.”