The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
TECH TOPS BC; NO. 5 AUBURN ROUTS UGA
AUBURN, ALA. — every basketball time he and touched Pretty certainly much the
— every foul Georgia’s heard line, chants time which Anthony he of went “overrated, was Edwards a to lot the — overrated!” ity on Saturday. crowd at from Auburn It was the capac- Arena to hard day argue Edwards anyway. with was them, not on good. this In the unglued his Bulldogs defense, against as neither No. they 5-ranked came were losing and still 82-60. undefeated Auburn, Tigers improved 15-0 SEC The overall while Georgia and 3-0 fell in the to to 10-5, for his 0-2. Edwards at the is foul known line, poise among court, but other he places missed on seven the of his first nine free throws Saturday. He also missed his first six 3-point attempts and seven of his first nine field-goal attempts overall as Georgia let an early lead disintegrate into a blowout.
“That doesn’t really bother me,” Edwards said of the crowd’s chants. “I was frus- trated that I couldn’t make free throws. Other than that, I don’t really care about stuff like that.”
Edwards made his first 3-pointer with 9:16 remaining in the game, which drew sarcastic applause. Georgia was trailing by 22 before the ball went through the hoop. The freshman came in averaging 18.5 points and finished with 18, but all but three of his points came with the Bulldogs woefully behind. “I was just missing them; there’s not much I can say about it,” Edwards said of his errant attempts. Edwards wasn’t alone in his struggle. The Bulldogs went to the free-throw line 33 times and made only 17 (51.5%). Auburn shot better from the field (53.2%). Worse, the Bulldogs missed a lot of layups and open shots as well, and let that affect them in other areas, chiefly defense and rebounding. Coach Tom Crean included Edwards in that group. “I don’t think it’s frustration, I think it’s youth,” Crean said. “When our shots aren’t going, like layups and our free throws aren’t going, which is an anomaly for us, we let it affect our defense. We let it affect our rebounding big time. It’s the difference in going against a highly mature Final Four team that plays with tremendous spirit and energy versus a team that’s got to find some collective leadership.”
The Tigers weren’t quite as lethal from long range as they were a year ago when they made a Final Four run, but they made enough — nine out of 24 attempts. The senior-laden Tigers were led by senior guard Samir Doughty’s 17 points, including two 3s, and Anfernee McElmore and Allen Flani- gan added 17 apiece. McElmore, a senior from Worth County, improved to 5-0 against his state’s university.
Flanigan was assigned to guard Edwards. “It meant a lot to be able to go out there and guard him and show what I could do,” said Flani- gan, a 6-5 freshman from Lit- tle Rock, Ark. “I just tried to stay on his right hand and make him go to the left.”
Freshman Sahvir Wheeler got his first career start for the Bulldogs. The Houston native got the nod over senior Tyree Crump. Wheeler had been logging the majority of minutes at the lead-guard position but just wasn’t starting the games.
Georgia got off to an ideal start, scoring the game’s first six points and missing out on an even bigger lead with two empty possessions. But the Bulldogs kept the pres- sure on and built a 14-6 lead by the 12:45 mark. It was all Auburn after that. Wheeler drew his second foul at the 13:26 mark and went to the bench. Then the Bulldogs started turning the ball over. They had eight turnovers in the first half.
Couple that with missed shots — Georgia was 8-for-25 — and the result was a lot of empty possessions. The Bulldogs went the last 6:29 of the first half without a field goal, while Auburn finished the half on a 17-5 run.
Auburn had a lot of empty possessions early, but as has been their trademark under coach Bruce Pearl, the Tigers started landing their long 3s. They were 6-of-14 from behind the arc to Georgia’s 2-for-7, and that was essentially the difference in the half. Auburn went to the locker room leading 35-24.
Auburn picked up where it left off in the second half, and so did the Bulldogs. Edwards appeared to start pressing, and Georgia began to succumb to the environment. Crean called a timeout with Georgia trailing 46-27 with 16:29 to play. The lead would only grow from there.
After playing three consecutive top-14 opponents — and winning one of those at Memphis — the Bulldogs have plenty to work on before coming back home to face Tennessee (10-5, 2-1 SEC). “I’m definitely going to get in the gym and work on my free throws,” said Edwards, with a slight grin. “I don’t fault myself for the loss, but (making) free throws is something I’ve got to do.”