ATHENS -- Once again, the Georgia men's basketball team built a commanding first-half lead. And this time, the Bulldogs held it firmly.
Georgia led South Carolina by 17 points at halftime Saturday night and avoided its recent habit of second-half collapses, rolling to a 64-48 victory over the Gamecocks in front of 10,355 fans at Stegeman Coliseum.
It was the seventh consecutive game that the Bulldogs led at halftime, but they lost three of the previous six and were forced to overtime in another. At South Carolina two weeks ago, they watched a 28-9 halftime lead dwindle to a four-point victory.
This one was different.
"We could have won plenty of games the same way, but we let the other teams come back," Georgia forward Travis Leslie said. "Tonight, we just decided to go all out in the second half. I feel like [in] the other games, we got a little complacent and comfortable."
Georgia coach Mark Fox reminded his players at halftime that their 17-point lead guaranteed nothing, pointing out that an even larger lead all but vanished against the same opponent Feb. 12.
The Gamecocks were having a similar conversation.
"This is a team that we have already come back on, and this is a team that's lost a lot of leads," South Carolina coach Darrin Horn said of Georgia. "We talked about that before the game, and we talked about that during the game."
Briefly true to recent form, Georgia didn't start well in the second half, failing to score in the first 3 1/2 minutes as South Carolina went on a little 5-0 run to cut the Bulldogs' lead to 12 points at 39-27.
"We didn't let it get to us," Leslie said.
Fox quickly called a timeout, and the Gamecocks would get no closer.
"From that timeout forward," Fox said, "we played solid basketball."
Georgia led by 21 points with 11:48 to play and by 24 with 6:34 left, and by the end, five backup players were on the floor.
The win was important for Georgia's NCAA tournament prospects. Since the Bulldogs' victory at Tennessee a week earlier, most "bracketologists" have projected the Bulldogs to reach the tournament if they could close out their home schedule without slipping up against South Carolina, the last-place team in the SEC East, or LSU, the next-to-last-place team in the SEC West.
Georgia will take a 19-9 record (8-6 SEC) into Wednesday's home finale against LSU (11-18, 3-11). The Bulldogs are tied with Kentucky for third place in the SEC East, three games behind first-place Florida (11-3) and one behind second-place Vanderbilt (9-5).
"It being February, and going into March, our program is still playing for something, and I'm extremely pleased with that," Fox said. "But we still have to take care of business."
The win over South Carolina continued Georgia's mastery of Saturday games this season. The Bulldogs are 9-1 on Saturdays, including 7-1 in SEC games. Their only loss on a Saturday was Jan. 29 at Kentucky. On all other days, the Bulldogs are 10-8 (1-5 SEC).
Trey Thompkins led Georgia with 20 points in their latest Saturday success, while Leslie had 15 and Jeremy Price 14. South Carolina shot 1-for-19 from 3-point range and had no player with more than 11 points.
Fox's biggest complaint seemed to be Price's decision in the first half to forgo an easy layup to flip the ball back to a trailing Leslie for a dunk attempt -- a bit of theatrics that thrilled the crowd but not the coach. A livid Fox briefly yanked Price from the game.
"It almost gave me a heart attack, and then he almost died," Fox said of the play. "We got caught up in emotion, and [Price] knew it was probably not the smartest thing. Fortunately for us, it didn't cost us."
Leslie was fouled before he could dunk, made the first free throw, missed the second and, typical of the way the game went for the Dogs, grabbed his own rebound and scored.
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