Lexington, Ky. -- Georgia didn't play particularly well nor particularly smart. But the Bulldogs played hard, and that was nearly enough as they fell to Kentucky 61-55 here at Rupp Arena on Tuesday night.

After falling behind by 16 points in the game's first seven minutes, Georgia clawed back and was within three points with less than four minutes to play. But bad shots, blocked shots and missed shots limited the Bulldogs to three points in the game's final 6:27, and Kentucky was able to hold on.

In that span Georgia missed four 3-point shots, had three shots blocked and turned the ball over once. Zac Swansey's 3-pointer with 12 seconds remaining was the only positive offensive play, and then it was too late.

"Down the stretch we would have liked to have some of those possessions back where we weren't quite composed enough to get something better than what we got," said Georgia coach Dennis Felton, who falls to 4-8 against the Wildcats. "I didn't think we were quite composed enough to do a better job with our offensive possessions. Some of them were [Kentucky] making some big-time defensive plays. But there were some where we took more difficult shots than we should have settled for."

Georgia's Terrance Woodbury missed a lot of those shots. The junior led the team with 11 points in the first half, but he missed several open looks in the second half and finished with 15 points on 5-of-15 shooting.

"Every time the ball leaves my hand, it feels good," Woodbury said. "I've got a 50 percent chance of making any shot I'm taking. I was on the positive side in the first half and the negative side in the second half. I just didn't knock them down."

Trailing 55-52 with five minutes to play, Woodbury got a wide open shot from the top of the key. He missed it.

Sundiata Gaines came away with a steal on the Kentucky's ensuing possession, then clanked a 3-point try early in the shot clock.

Kentucky got a rare double-miss from Ramel Bradley on two free throws only to see Swansey miss a jump shot and Woodbury miss a short bank shot after an offensive rebound.

"They did pick up the intensity defensively," said Gaines, who had 10 points and 10 rebounds for the Bulldogs but went 4-of-14 from the field. "They did a great job of shading me with two guys on my drive, and that made it more difficult. But we had some opportunities that, if we make them, we probably win they game.

Three days after a 74-71 loss to No. 2 Tennessee, the Bulldogs suffered another close defeat, and their record falls to 12-12, 3-8 in the SEC.

The Wildcats (14-10, 8-3) move a step closer to making their once-wishful NCAA hopes a reality. They remain second in the SEC East and complete a season sweep of the Bulldogs.

Kentucky was led by Joe Crawford with 23 points, 14 of which came in the first half. Patrick Patterson added 20, and Bradley had 8 points and 12 rebounds.

Kentucky fans began booing Georgia's Bliss in pregame warm-ups and continued every time he touched the ball. The Bulldogs' senior center is disliked in Bluegrass Country for his hard foul from behind on Kentucky guard Ramel Bradley on Feb. 2 in Athens. Bradley suffered a grade 2 concussion on the play and sat out the rest of that game.

Junior Billy Humphrey made his return from a three-game disciplinary suspension. He did not start -- freshman Zac Swansey did -- but entered the game as a substitute for Woodbury at the 16:23 mark of the first half. He played 20 minutes and finished with 3 points.

Georgia, which had wiped out a huge deficit to get within three late in the first half, hung with the Wildcats for a good while in the second half. The Bulldogs trailed 42-38 after Corey Butler's four-point play -- he was fouled on a 3-point shot -- at the 14:29 mark.

Then Georgia went dry, and Patterson got busy. The Wildcats' big freshman center scored on three of their next six possessions, the last of those being a fast-break layup that drew a UGA timeout. Just like that, the Wildcats led 52-41.

The Bulldogs continued to scrap and quickly got the deficit back down to five after a Humphrey 3-point shot, but they missed a golden opportunity to get even closer when freshman Jeremy Price missed a one-handed dunk just inside the 8-minute mark. Crawford scored on a putback off the ensuing fast break, and the Wildcats were back ahead 55-44.

"It's always challenging trying to come back from a large deficit on the road," Gaines said. "But we fought our way back into the game and were down three with five minutes left. We just missed a lot of opportunities and rushed some, including myself. I took a couple of shots that maybe I shouldn't have taken. But we never gave up."