ATHENS — Rupp Arena is where win streaks normally go to die. But the Georgia Bulldogs will head there Tuesday night on a bus loaded with good vibes and confidence and are determined to buck the odds against Kentucky.
The historical ledger says there’s somewhere between a 7% chance and a 17% chance that Georgia knocks off the Wildcats in Lexington. The Bulldogs are 27-130 overall against Kentucky and 5-63 when playing in the Bluegrass State. But the basketball program has undergone a transfusion under first-year coach Mike White.
Georgia has won six of its past seven outings since final exams last month, and its win totals of 13-4 overall and 3-1 in the SEC are more than double what UGA did all last season. With a 62-58 win over Ole Miss on Saturday, the Bulldogs recorded their first road win since beating Auburn on Feb. 2, 2021. Coupled with the win Wednesday over Mississippi State, Georgia also recorded its first back-to-back conference wins in two seasons. They’re off to their best SEC start since the 2016-17 campaign.
To which Kentucky says, “bring it on.”
“Winning at Kentucky is a whole different deal,” White said during a video conference call with reporters Monday. “They’re coming off probably the best win of the season in college basketball this year at Tennessee, who has a chance to win the whole thing. This is a Kentucky team coming off a big-time performance, especially defensively. Every point is going to be difficult to come by, but if we play really well, who knows?”
The Wildcats (11-6, 2-3 SEC) have struggled, relatively speaking, in their 14th season under coach John Calipari. But there are indications he’s righting the ship. Kentucky knocked off No. 5 Tennessee 63-56 on Saturday in Knoxville.
The chief problem when it comes to facing the Wildcats is Oscar Tshiebwe. The 6-foot-9, 260-pound senior enters Tuesday night’s game averaging 15.9 points and 13.1 rebounds a game.
Georgia is as well-suited as any team to combat him. The Bulldogs feature a pair of post players in 6-11 Braelen Bridges and 6-10 Frank Anselem who can match Tshiebwe’s size if not his athletic ability. And what they might lack in Tshiebwe’s unique ability to rebound, the Bulldogs make up for in a team approach to crashing the boards.
Currently, Kentucky and Georgia sport two of the better rebound margins in college basketball. The Wildcats rank 10th nationally at plus-8.1 rpg, while the Bulldogs rank 30th at plus-6.0. While no Georgia player ranks among the nation’s top 350 rebounders, eight players average between 3.0 and 5.5. Georgia has won the rebound count in 14 of 17 games.
“The defensive glass is enormous for us, which starts and ends with Oscar,” White said.
Of course, there is much more to both teams. Georgia got an incredible performance from guard Kario Oquendo against Ole Miss. The 6-4 junior scored the last 12 points of the game as the Bulldogs rallied for a 62-58 win.
There is nothing like playing at 25,000-seat Rupp Arena, which is expected to be sold out as usual for Tuesday’s night’s SEC game of the week.
“Playing there, if you’ve never played there before, you’ll go in there and look up in the rafters and see all the fans and stuff like that,” Oquendo said Monday. “I think I got really used to that last year. We played a couple of packed-out games. After that, you’ve just got to go out there and play like business as usual.”
After what he’s seen so far, White’s certainly not counting his team out.
“I think our guys feel like we’ll have a chance to be competitive,” White said. “A couple months ago, I’m not sure that would have been the collective thought.”
Dawg Tags: The AJC presents a daily look at the one thing you need to know about Georgia athletics today.
