It’s hard to miss Russel Tchewa.

At 7-foot and 280 pounds, the graduate transfer from South Florida has a way of standing out.

After his performance in Saturday’s 75-68 win at Missouri, future Georgia opponents will be keeping an eye on him, too.

“We just translated what we did in practice the last two weeks,” Tchewa said. “We’ve been going hard, we’ve had really, really good practices, so we just translated that into the game. We came in ready to play.”

Tchewa certainly did.

The Cameroon native enjoyed his best game as a Bulldog, posting his first double-double in a Georgia uniform, scoring a team-high 18 points to go along with 11 boards.

He was almost perfect, hitting all five of his field goal attempts.

“He got to his spots early, then he did what he had to do,” guard Noah Thomasson said in a post-game interview on the SEC Network. “He did what he had to do at the rim. Credit to him. We’re going to be needing him the whole season, so I’m proud of Russ.”

So is head coach Mike White, who said the original plan was not to have Tchewa play quite as long as he did.

“Russ was in such a good rhythm, offensively and defensively, and he’s such a well-conditioned guy,” White said. “He carries 280 but he never gets tired in practice. He’s consistently at the front in our conditioning segments, so he played more minutes than normal.”

Tchewa’s 29 minutes marked the fourth-most he’s played in a game this year.

“I remember in the summertime, we were going really, really hard with conditioning," Tchewa said. "Coach Crane (Director of Athletic Performance Collin Crane) always said, we’re running today, but it’s going to show up later. He was right, because we were in shape today.”

Tchewa’s best stretch of play came when Georgia needed it the most, especially on the defensive end.

Over the final 4 minutes and 19 seconds, Tchewa pulled down five of his 11 rebounds, including two on the offensive end.

A quick feed to Justin Hill off an offensive board resulted in a three-pointer by the Bulldog guard to put Georgia in front 66-65. An ensuing defensive board led to a three-pointer by Silas Demary Jr. to put the Bulldogs up by four.

Two other defensive rebounds came during five straight scoreless trips down the court for Missouri, allowing Georgia to build its lead.

“It was just our ability to switch defenses,” said Tchewa, who converted three of four free throw attempts over the final three minutes.

The one miss was his only blemish in nine attempts.

“It’s a big thing, we emphasize that in practice every single day,” Tchewa said. “We’re shooting free throws every five or seven minutes; we just translate that to the game.”

He hopes Saturday’s win at Missouri was just the beginning.

Georgia only won a single SEC road game all of last year, beating Ole Miss in Oxford, 62-58.

Saturday’s win came after the Bulldogs blew a 17-point first-half lead, before ultimately settling down in the second half.

“Coach said we just need to play harder than them to have a chance to win,” Tchewa said. “It’s very, very hard to win on the road in this league. Coach did a good job.”

In a league known for its toughness, Tchewa said he’s ready for what the rest of the year will bring.

“This conference is just so physical, but I feel comfortable with the physical aspect,” he said. “That’s one of the reasons we were ready to play. We knew it was going to be physical. We were prepared.”

With Arkansas up next Wednesday at Stegeman Coliseum (9 p.m., ESPNU), Tchewa knows it will be another challenge.

“Every game is different. We had a game plan for Missouri, and we’ll have a different game plan for Arkansas,” he said. “But coaches will do a good job of putting a good game plan across.”