Georgia fights but falls to No. 14 Auburn in convincing fashion
ATHENS, Ga. — Georgia Basketball dropped Saturday’s home game against Auburn 97-76. While the Bulldogs got their deficit down to a single score with under 10:00 to go, the Tigers pulled away for a 21-point win at Stegeman Coliseum.
Noah Thomasson led Georgia in scoring with 18 points, followed by Silas Demary and Russel Tchewa who had 16 each. Tchewa also pulled down a team-high number of rebounds.
Meanwhile, for Auburn, four Tigers reached double-figures including Chad Baker-Mazara, who had 25. Johni Broome and Chaney Johnson added 16 each while Aden Holloway had 15 of his own. Broome recorded a double-double with 13 rebounds – his third career double-double in as many games against Georgia.
How It Happened…
Georgia came out fighting, but some impressive early shooting from Auburn put the Tigers ahead. Chad Baker-Mazara scored eight of the first 16 points for Auburn including a pair of 3-pointers that had Georgia trailing 16-8 at the first stoppage in play. That Bulldog deficit was up to double-digits shortly after with Auburn going on an 8-0 run.
Another Auburn run, this time 7-0, made it a 12-point advantage for the Tigers about halfway through the first 20:00. Georgia had it within single digits at several different points, but the Bulldogs simply were too sloppy to gain much ground.
Silas Demary put together a strong first half with 13 points on 4-of-7 shooting while making five of his six attempts from the free throw stripe, but with Auburn shooting 60.7% from the field including six makes from 3-point range, the Tigers entered the locker room leading 45-34.
The Bulldogs did enough to hang around early in the second half before being able to score 10 of the game’s 12 points. Noah Thomasson made jumpers on consecutive trips down the floor before a put back layup following his own miss. A Justin Hill 3-pointer on the next possession made it a 5-point game before Auburn called a timeout to try and slow things down.
It didn’t work. Demary came up with a steal out of the timeout and was fouled in transition. His two free throws at the 11:49 mark made it a one-score game for the first time since just over 3:00 in to the game.
Auburn’s Johni Broome and Georgia’s Russel Tchewa decided to do battle as the big men hit six of the game’s next seven buckets. Bad news for the Bulldogs, one of those was a 3-pointer by Broome, and it was followed shortly after by a pair of 3-pointers from KD Johnson and Aden Holloway to put Auburn ahead by double-digits once again. Holloway hit another that made it a 15-point game and prompted a timeout by Georgia head coach Mike White with 6:03 to go.
Auburn continued to pull away late with more made shots from Johnson, Broome, Baker-Mazara and Holloaway. Thomasson and Tchewa did what they could for Georgia, but it wasn’t enough for the Bulldogs with the Tigers winning convincingly.
Georgia, now 15-12 overall, 5-9 in league play and guaranteed to finish no better than .500 in the SEC for the eighth consecutive season, heads to Baton Rouge on Tuesday for a matchup with LSU. The Tigers play Mississippi State later on Saturday but recently beat consecutive ranked opponents with wins over South Carolina and Kentucky.
UGA won the earlier meeting of the two teams in Athens on January 24th. Russel Tchewa put the Bulldogs ahead with just 2.3 seconds to go for a 68-66 victory. Tip time for Tuesday night is set for 7:00 p.m. ET on SEC Network.
