The long debate about whether Georgia is in or out of the NCAA tournament might be resolved Friday afternoon at the Georgia Dome.
The Bulldogs routed Auburn 69-51 in the opening game of the SEC tournament Thursday, setting up a bubble battle with Alabama in the quarterfinals.
Beat Alabama, and Georgia can expect to find itself in the NCAA tournament when the field is announced Sunday evening. Lose to Alabama, and the Bulldogs might find themselves absent from the 68-team field.
So say the "bracketologists," the experts of the bracket, and who are the Bulldogs to argue?
"If that's the way they look at it," Trey Thompkins said Thursday, "then we have to win it."
Thompkins ensured that the Bulldogs (21-10) would get a shot at the Crimson Tide (20-10) by playing one of his best games of the season in the victory over Auburn (11-20).
He scored 22 points, his highest-scoring game since he had 25 against Kentucky on Jan. 8, and claimed 10 rebounds. He made three of five shots (60 percent) from 3-point range after making only 17 of 66 (25.8 percent) previously this season.
The strong performance came one day after Thompkins, who has battled ankle, shin and toe injuries, declared himself the healthiest he has been all season.
"He looked like it," Auburn coach Tony Barbee said.
Thompkins' breakthrough came at an encouraging time for the Bulldogs, who hope to make noise in this tournament and beyond.
"I'm happy and excited for what the future holds," Thompkins said, "but we have to take care of business [Friday] in order to have a future."
Georgia and Alabama tip off at 1 p.m. -- a rematch of both teams' regular-season finale six days ago.
Alabama won that game, 65-57 in Tuscaloosa, behind the outside shooting of guard Charvez Davis, whose 17 points included five 3-pointers, and the inside dominance of forward JaMychal Green, who had 19 points and nine rebounds. Georgia had twice as many turnovers (16) as assists (eight) against Alabama.
"We didn't play our ‘A' game," Georgia's Travis Leslie said Thursday. "We know we can compete with them, know we can beat them. ... But they're a very aggressive team, a great defensive team."
Said Georgia coach Mark Fox: "We have to play better in a lot of areas."
The rematch will draw considerable attention from the NCAA bracket analysts who see both teams on the bubble. Although the RPI ranks Georgia (39) much higher than Alabama (83), the Bulldogs could be undermined by a second loss in a week to the Tide.
ESPN bracket expert Joe Lunardi calls the matchup "a fork in the road" for the two teams' NCAA hopes and a de facto "elimination game" as far as the NCAA bracket is concerned.
Fox doesn't accept that premise, contending for the past week or so that the Bulldogs' season-long "body of work" should be attractive to the NCAA selection committee.
"There's two good teams playing [Friday]," Fox said. "I have no idea where either one of us sits in the eyes of the committee, and we can't control that. So all we're going to worry about is trying to advance in this tournament."
On Thursday, Georgia advanced easily past Auburn, a team that the Bulldogs had to go into overtime to beat Feb. 5 in Athens. This time, the Bulldogs led from start to finish, mostly by comfortable margins. They led by as many as 15 in the first half, by 11 at halftime and by as many as 21 in the second half.
Georgia used its size advantage to outrebound Auburn 39-27, including 18-8 on the offensive boards. And the Bulldogs, principally Leslie, held Auburn guard Earnest Ross to four points -- 26 fewer than he scored in the regular-season game against Georgia.
Before leaving the Dome on Thursday, Barbee said that in his view "there's no question" the Bulldogs belong in the NCAA tournament. Whether they get there, though, might depend on how they fare against Auburn's arch-rival.
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