Georgia falls to Kentucky for second straight loss
By Keith Holt
The Georgia Bulldogs fell short in their quest to be the 1 in Kentucky’s 21-1. Instead the Wildcats remained undefeated by handing the Dawgs a 69-58 defeat at Rupp Arena. Mark Fox’s team went into the shorthanded as it was the 2nd game in a row without leading scorer and rebounder Marcus Thornton. The Bulldogs now are 5-4 in SEC play and 14-7 overall on the season.
Georgia was not able to the engine started early in the game as they fell behind to Kentucky 11-1 early on in the game. The Bulldogs did not hit their first shot from the field until the 15:44 mark in the game. Kentucky only allowed Mark Fox’s club three shot attempts at that point in the contest. The Wildcats shut the Dawgs down with smothering defense and force them into 12 turnovers before halftime.
Kentucky did a good job protecting the rim and not giving Georgia good looks. The bright spot in the early going was forward Nemanja Djurisic who led the team with 9 points. One of the most shocking stats from the early going was that guard JJ Frazier who has been offensive spark plug for the Dawgs did not have a shot attempt the entire first half.
The Wildcats came out in the second half and started strong stretched the game out to an 18-point lead at one point. The Bulldogs would not go away and found ways to correct some of their first half mistakes. They tightened up on defense and limited their turnovers to only four after halftime as opposed to the 12 they had earlier. Guard JJ Frazier came alive in the second half with eight points that included two big 3-pointers. At the 2:07 mark the Bulldogs were only down by five points but Kentucky never let the lead go. There are no moral victories but shorthanded Bulldogs did show some fight.
The bulk of Georgia’s scoring came from their big men and was led by forward Nemanja Djurisic 17 points and seven rebounds. The Bulldogs also got a career high 13 points from freshman forward Yante Maten.
Kentucky saw a big game from guard Andrew Harrison who had 23 points for the Wildcats and forward Karl Anthony-Towns added 15 points and 13 rebounds.
Next up for the Bulldogs is a home game against SEC East rival Tennessee on February 7.