Georgia and Arkansas have been tabbed early on as a couple of NCAA hopefuls from the SEC, and they looked like as they scrapped Tuesday night at Stegeman Coliseum.
The Bulldogs and Razorbacks battled in their SEC opener like a tournament berth lay in the balance, and it was No. 23 Arkansas that finally prevailed, 79-75.
“That was a high-level game; that was like an NCAA tournament game right there,” Georgia coach Mark Fox said. “Both teams got after it, but they made more plays than we did. We made our share; we competed hard. But they earned the victory tonight.”
The Bulldogs (9-4, 0-1 SEC) led by as many as 13 points in the first half. But they committed 11 of their 17 turnovers after halftime and allowed Arkansas to shoot 57.7 percent from the field during the same span. The Razorbacks used that formula to finally run down Georgia in the last 10 minutes and blow past them in the final five. A raucous crowd of 7,937 was on hand for what turned out to be the Bulldogs’ first home loss of the season.
Bobby Portis led the Razorbacks (10-3, 1-0) with 21 points, Michael Qualls added 17 and Alandise Harris scored nine of his 15 in the second half. It was a rare road victory for Arkansas, which had rewarded coach Mike Anderson with a tw0-year contract extension earlier in the day. The Razorbacks were 10-35 on the road under their coach previously.
Nemanja Djurisic led five Bulldogs in double figures with 16 points and Georgia out-rebounded its visitors 40-25 in the losing effort. But shaky defense, turnovers and poor foul-shooting overshadowed a solid offensive performance.
“We just got out-played in the second half,” said sophomore guard J.J. Frazier, who scored 10 points but was 4-of-12 shooting. “That’s it, bottom line, they out-played us. We didn’t play with poise in the second half.”
Marcus Thornton’s putback of a missed 3-pointer by Charles Mann got Georgia to within a bucket, 77-75, with four seconds remaining. But the Bulldogs’ foul-shooting woes left them short of time and points. They were 16-of-24 from the line, and 8-of-14 after intermission.
Conversely, Qualls made the ones that mattered in the end. He was good on both ends of a one-and-one with four seconds to go (6-of-7 for the game) and Georgia would never get off another shot.
The Bulldogs have four days to shake off the disappointment before hitting the road for another high-level opponent in LSU. The Tigers (11-2) will be coming off a Thursday road game at Missouri before they face Georgia in Baton Rouge late Saturday night.
“I don’t think (the loss) will have any effect because we’re a very strong unit,” Georgia’s Djurisic said. “We play together, we stay together and we believe in each other. It’s a hiccup. It’s an adversity we’ll play through and we’ll be able to come back.”
After leading by as many as 13 points in the first half, Georgia saw Arkansas’ pressure, trapping defense start wreaking havoc in the second half. The Razorbacks were fouling a lot while — the Bulldogs were in the bonus by the 12-minute mark — but Georgia wasn’t sharp enough at the foul line to take advantage of it.
So Arkansas kept creeping forward. Freshman guard Anton Beard’s 3-pointer knotted the game at 61 with 8:46 to play. That came shortly after the Bulldogs committed their sixth turnover of the second half. They’d had only six in the whole first half.
Arkansas took its first lead of the game, 63-61, on Harris’ high-arcing jumper with 6:30 to go. The Razorbacks would get it to six from there, which was enough to withstand a couple of volleys from Georgia over the last few minutes.
Arkansas was up 74-70 inside the final minute Michael Qualls was whistled for traveling. After the subsequent timeout, the Bulldogs had a chance to make a final charge. But Kenny Gaines missed a contested 3-point shot from the corner and Djurisic failed to convert what should have been an easy putback.
The Razorbacks found Qualls loose down the floor after the resulting rebound and his one-handed slam served as emphatic punctuation for Arkansas’s eventual victory.
“In this league, there’s 18 unbelievable battles,” Fox said. “You’ve got to be emotionally ready to let one go and get ready for the next one. Certainly there are going to be many more slugfests throughout SEC play. We’ve got to be ready to move beyond this one.”
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