Hugh Durham made the call Feb. 6. The winningest coach in UGA history was speaking to the Coliseum Club in a pregame dinner before Georgia tipped off in a home game against LSU, and he told the group he didn’t see a team ahead of the Bulldogs they couldn’t beat.
It’s not like Durham was parroting a popular view. At that point, Georgia was coming off consecutive losses to Kentucky, Vanderbilt and Auburn. But Durham was speaking from the vantage point of a coach, and he based his thoughts on what he was seeing on the court.
The Bulldogs made him look good. They throttled LSU 91-78 that evening, and they won eight of the 10 games they’ve played since. As a result, Georgia (18-12, 12-6 SEC) enters the quarterfinals of the SEC tournament with the No. 3 seed and unofficial title of “most likely team not named Florida to win the tournament.” They will play either Ole Miss or Mississippi State in Friday’s late game at the Georgia Dome.
So what Georgia has done — winning the most SEC games in a season since Durham’s 1990 team won 13 to claim the regular-season championship — did not come as a surprise to the Bulldogs’ former coach. But what was it he saw five weeks ago that others weren’t seeing?
“I just think Mark Fox is a good coach,” Durham said. “You can see that when you watch them play. He needs to get him some more players in there, but I’m telling you he can flat-out coach. I think he’s done a better job coaching this year than everybody else in the league, with the exception of (Florida’s Billy) Donovan.”
That’s certainly high praise, but it’s just the kind of accolade the Bulldogs are trying to avoid as they enter postseason play. Everybody is singing Georgia’s praises after it overcame a 6-6 start in non-conference play and played its way into a second-place tie with Kentucky. Their backs are black-and-blue from all the patting.
“That’s the great thing about being on spring break,” Georgia coach Mark Fox said. “There’s less people to do that to us. I promise you, we’ve made sure they’re geared back on playing the game the right way.”
The Bulldogs also know they haven’t accomplished anything yet. With an RPI of 75, most NCAA bracket forecasters say the only way Georgia gets into the “Big Dance” is by winning tournament championship and the automatic qualifier that comes with it. As it stands now, even an NIT bid is an uncertainty.
But that kind of big-picture goal-setting isn’t what got Georgia into this position in the first place. As usual, the Bulldogs come into this event with a one-game-at-a-time focus.
“The championship for us is 9:30 Friday night,” said junior Marcus Thornton, Georgia’s leading rebounder. “I know everybody is tired of hearing that, but that’s just how it’s got to be, and that’s the way we have to be to be successful. You just handle it one step at a time.”
Said leading scorer Charles Mann: “We have tremendous belief in each other and in the process. We feel like we could make a run and win it. But we’ve got to win the next game in order for that to come true.”
There’s plenty of precedent. You need look no further than last year’s SEC tournament in Nashville, Tenn., to find a No. 3 seed that knocked off the league champion to win the tournament title. Ole Miss tied Kentucky for second, got the No. 3 seed based on tiebreakers, then won two games before knocking off Florida to win the championship.
Georgia has an almost identical scenario this year, with the added benefit of the tournament being played in its backyard. It, too, is in the bracket opposite No. 1-ranked Florida, which went 18-0 in the league. If the Bulldogs can win Friday night’s quarterfinal game, odds are they’ll get No. 2 Kentucky in semifinals Saturday.
The Wildcats defeated Georgia 79-54 on Jan. 25 in Lexington. But the Bulldogs played without either of their shooting guards. Kenny Gaines and Juwan Parker sat out with injuries.
Of course, Kentucky has had incredible success in Atlanta. Six of the Wildcats’ 27 tournament titles have come in the 13 times it was played in Atlanta.
That stat does nothing but irk Fox. “I’m sick of hearing about ‘Catlanta,’” he said. “It IS the Georgia Dome, so I hope that we’ll have representation.”
Durham, for one, predicts that Georgia can get it done.
“I don’t think Kentucky is as good as Georgia,” Durham said. “I think Georgia will beat Kentucky if they play again. I really do.”
No one in the Coliseum Club is apt to doubt his predictions.
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