ATHENS – Georgia basketball held a players-only meeting after Sunday’s loss to Wofford. The 68-65 defeat was only the second ever to Terriers and it dropped the Bulldogs to 2-5 on the season.
Junior Jaxon Etter said the in-house message simply was that Georgia has a much better collection of players than the record indicates and that clearer communication and sharper execution can quickly change their fortunes.
“I told them, ‘This is the best basketball team that I have been a part of since I have been at Georgia,’” said Etter, who has played with Anthony Edwards and Sahvir Wheeler, among others, the previous two seasons. “I say that in complete honesty. We have shown when we communicate and when we talk and play together, we are a really good basketball team. When we don’t, you can see that we are losing basketball games. We’ve got to fix that consistency because it’s shown that we can be a really good basketball team.”
The Bulldogs will need to be much better Wednesday when No. 19 Memphis visits Stegeman Coliseum. The Tigers (5-1) were ranked No. 9 before losing to Iowa State in their last outing.
Memphis also was ranked No. 9 when it last played Georgia. Led by Edwards and Wheeler and others, the Bulldogs pulled off a 65-62 upset in Memphis on Jan. 4, 2020.
To duplicate such a shocker, Georgia will have to shoot, defend and take care of the basketball markedly better than it has been. The Bulldogs are averaging 14.4 turnovers a game and had 19 in the loss to Wofford. They also gave up far too many easy shots at critical times against the Terriers (5-2).
In Georgia’s defense, a cold and flu outbreak within the team hasn’t helped matters. Some players have sat out altogether while others have fought through and played in various degrees of health issues.
They’re approaching full strength again, but a toll still is being exacted.
“It’s just been lingering,” coach Tom Crean said Tuesday. “Some new things have surfaced, and we are trying to get over it and be healthier. I do think that this team is improving, and I think their work ethic is strong. It’s like anything else. You deal with injuries, you deal with things during the year, and right now we’re dealing with a little bit of sickness.”
While they’re still trying to mesh as a team of 10 newcomers that lost their only returning starter to injury, Georgia clearly has some good parts. Cook, the Gonzaga transfer who has been among those fighting through illness, ranks second in the SEC in both total assists and assist average. Nationally, his assist total of 49 passes-to-points was No. 4 and his 7.0 apg effort was No. 5.
Meanwhile, and senior transfer Braelen Bridges has been incredibly consistent. The 6-11 forward led the SEC and was No. 28 nationally in shooting efficiency (63.2 percent) entering Tuesday night’s games.
Where Georgia hasn’t been particularly efficient has been on defense. Crean tried to address that in the last game by giving freshman Christian Wright his first career start.
Crean likes what he saw from the 6-3 shooting guard from Alpharetta.
“We’ve started different guys at the 2 (position),” Crean said. “It’s really important that we get great energy, defensively to start the game. It’s really, really important that the ball moves at a high level to start the game. Christian Wright provides both of those things. Not to say that the other guys don’t, but we have to get the pressure turned up. … It’s just the decision I made to evoke a little bit different defensive energy into the lineup.”
As for the player-led meeting, Crean said he’s all for it.
“I think that stuff is great,” he said. “These guys want to win. The bottom line with this team – I mean obviously everybody knows its story. We don’t have a starter returning. We lose our leading returning scoring in PJ (Horne). We have 10 new players. We just have to learn how to win. The hard work. The time they put in. The attitude that they have. It’s all there. We just have to learn how to win.”
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