Georgia has lost games in many different ways under first-year coach Tom Crean. But the way they dropped Wednesday’s 68-67 loss to Mississippi State was one for the proverbial books.
With the game tied at 67 after Tyree Crump hit a three-pointer with just under 10 seconds left, the Bulldogs lobbed the inbound pass the length of the court into the hands of Quinndary Weatherspoon, who was fouled with 0.5 seconds by Jordan Harris.
That’s when things got interesting.
Weatherspoon missed his first shot, but as he did, a fan tossed a plush Beanie Dog toy onto the court. At that point, Crean grabbed the mic, imploring the crowd not to throw objects on the court—only to learn that the thrown toy had resulted in a technical foul, despite the fact no warning from the officials had been issued.
Weatherspoon, who already had another free throw coming, converted the technical free throw before intentionally missing his second, allowing the final horn to sound.
“To my knowledge, I’m 52 years of age, I’ve coached 19 years, been coaching and assisting other coaches since I was 20—I’ve never seen that, not without a warning or without an explanation,” Crean said. “You know what my thought process is. I saw something land on the floor, so my first reaction is to grab the mic myself, it’s something I’ve done my whole career. That usually takes care of it. I’ve had officials in the past thank me for doing it, but I didn’t know we were assessed a technical until I turned around and my coaches told me what was going on.”
Crean, who said the technical was called by the SEC crew of Steven Anderson, Byron Jarrett, and Wil Howard after he went to mic, wondered aloud how anyone could tell who threw the toy.
“I’m pretty sure you can call one (a technical) if you know whose fan base it was,” said Crean. “I’m just perplexed, because no one would tell me what was going on. It just makes zero sense to me. I’ve just got to get over it.”
Mississippi State head coach Ben Howland said he felt that Weatherspoon should have gotten the free throw back that he missed as the toy was thrown.
“I would be so frustrated if I was this team, the University of Georgia, if I was to have that happen,” Howland said. “That was crazy.”
This wasn’t the first time Howland has seen an incident where items were thrown on the court during a game.
He had.
“The fans at USCB (University of California Santa Barbara), after the first score of the game would throw out tortillas,” Howland said. “So, you would have thousands of tortillas sailing like frisbees. They outlawed that and said it was a technical, but it was done a number of times. But that’s the only time I’ve ever seen anything like that.”
Crean wishes he hadn’t.
Moments before, Crump brought the crowd of 7,153 to its feet when his three-pointer from just to the right of the key tied the game for the first time in the second half.
“When I hit that shot, I thought we had a good chance of winning the game,” said Crump. “I thought that it would probably go into overtime. I thought we were going to get a stop and go into overtime and try to win the game in overtime.”
But Mississippi State had other ideas when Weatherspoon—who scored a season-high 31 points—calmly sank the free throw that proved to be the difference.
For a while, it appeared that Georgia (10-16, 1-12) would be able to hang with their visitors from Starkville.
The Bulldogs led 24-20 with 3:57 left in the first half, until the bottom dropped out.
Big time.
Mississippi State closed the first half with a 16-1 run to take a 36-25 lead, ultimately outscoring the Bulldogs 22-1 into the second half before Derek Ogbeide stopped the snide with a driving layup three minutes into the second half.
But the Maroon—particularly Weatherspoon—wasn’t about to slow down.
Weatherspoon scored Mississippi State’s first 11 points of the second half before Perry nailed a three-pointer, pushing the lead back to 13 after Georgia had climbed within nine on a free throw by Jordan Harris, who led the Bulldogs with 13 points, followed by Rayshaun Hammonds with 12, Turtle Jackson with 11 with Crump and Ogbeide adding 10 each.
“I’m not sure a couple of weeks ago if we overcome that,” said Crean, whose team trailed in the second half by as many as 17 points. “We’re getting better. I think everybody can see it. I hope everybody can see it. The last two games we were good enough to win, but we just didn’t get the result.”
