Tennessee vs. Georgia
There are more than 50 games on the college basketball card for Wednesday, but the spotlight game is in the SEC with Tennessee vs. Georgia, a game that was supposed to be played on Tuesday, but got pushed back a day due to the winter storm that impacted a large portion of the country.
What head coach Mike White has done to get this Georgia program on the right path has been nothing short of amazing. Despite all of their success on the football field, the Bulldogs haven’t had much success on the basketball court, as they’ve only made the NCAA Tournament once since 2015. That was last season and White has his team poised for another Big Dance berth.
Tennessee, meanwhile, is a program very much accustomed to playing in March and they’re going to do so, but a 3-3 start in SEC play could absolutely impact their seeding when we get to that point. A second big road win in a row would go a long way in rehabbing some of the damage that those losses have done, as the Volunteers went into Tuscaloosa and scored their second Quadrant 1-A win of the season this past Saturday. They’ll hope for their third here in Athens.
This preview focuses solely on this game, but we’ve got daily best bets from Greg Peterson, as well as his daily spread and total projections, picks six days a week from Adam Burke, and men’s and women’s college basketball projections five days a week from Tyler Shoemaker, the proprietor of the T Shoe Index.
Odds from DraftKings Sportsbook as of January 27, 7:30 pm PT; check out our Circa Betting Splits and DraftKings Betting Splits.
Tennessee vs. Georgia (-2.5, 159.5)
7 p.m. ET (SEC Network)
For as big of a clash as this is, neither team is ranked. Bart Torvik has Tennessee as a top-20 team and so does KenPom, but the AP voters don’t see things that way. Georgia is 38th for Torvik and 33rd for KenPom. The Vols were technically 26th in the AP Poll for this week and Georgia was 28th, as those teams ranked first and third among those who got votes, but not enough for a Top 25 spot.
To circle back to what White has done thus far for the Bulldogs, he’s on the verge of a third straight season with 20+ wins. The Bulldogs were 20-17 in Year 1 and 20-13 in Year 2. Mark Fox had three straight 20-win seasons from 2014-16, with one NCAA Tournament appearance and a quick exit in the 7 vs. 10 game. Last year’s Bulldogs also bowed out quickly, falling in the first round with a 9 vs. 8 matchup. Obviously White has his sights set on something more this year.
Georgia is actually second in the nation in adjusted tempo, a huge departure from how we saw this team play last season. Despite the bump in pace, the Bulldogs are barely outside the top 40 in TO% on offense, a problem that plagued them last season with a TO% that approached 19% and ranked 291st in the country. That’s a pretty clear sign that White likes his talent and likes what his team is able to do in transition.
Per CBB Analytics, Georgia ranks in the 100th percentile in Fast Break Points Per Game and the 100th percentile in Percentage of Points on Fast Breaks. Over the last five games, even against stiffer competition, they’ve still pushed the issue, sitting in the 93rd and 91st percentiles, respectively. Teams led by Rick Barnes don’t move very quickly, but Tennessee has turned their takeaways into transition points and has also pushed the ball up the floor after defensive rebounds. The Vols are in the 81st percentile in Fast Break Points Per Game and in the 74th percentile in Percentage of Points on Fast Breaks, though both numbers have been higher in their last five games.
Both teams have also fallen off defensively of late. Tennessee ranks in the 40th percentile in Defensive Rating in the last five, while Georgia ranks in the 36th percentile. Both have good full-season numbers, but being locked into conference play in a league as skilled as the SEC has put some defensive shortcomings at the forefront.
Ironically, though, both teams have low eFG% numbers of late, with Georgia in the 22nd percentile over the last five and Tennessee in the 36th percentile. Perhaps that will be just what these two teams need to get things right on the defensive end. Or maybe it will shock both offenses back to life.
Barnes relies heavily on Ja’Kobi Gillespie (18.8 PPG, 5.5 APG) and Nate Ament (16.2 PPG, 6.4 RPG), as those are the only two players averaging over 27 minutes per game. Defensive stalwart Felix Okpara is just under 27 minutes per game and he’s averaging 1.6 blocks per contest as the primary rim protector. With Okpara’s presence, Tennessee does force teams away from the basket, as opponents have a 46% 3P Rate against, but they’re only shooting 29.7% on those attempts.
Georgia has a few stat sheet fillers, led by Jeremiah Wilkinson with 17.7 PPG. He’s shooting 37.4% from 3 on the season and could be doing even better on offense if he was finishing at a higher rate at the rim with just a 53.8% FG% on Close Twos as defined by Torvik. Blue Cain (13.6 PPG) and Marcus Millender (11.7 PPG) are the supplement scorers and two of the best free throw shooters in the conference, if it comes down to that for the Bulldogs to win the game.
It is important to take Georgia’s numbers with a grain of salt, as the Bulldogs played the 338th-ranked non-conference schedule as of now per Torvik, while Tennessee played the 171st-ranked schedule. Georgia is 13-1 in Quadrant 2 or lower games and 3-3 in Q1 games, including an 0-2 record in Q1-A games, which this game is. Tennessee is 3-5 in Q1 games and 2-4 in Q1-A games.
Tennessee vs. Georgia Prediction
My guess here is that we do get some transition offense from these two teams. Tennessee’s 20% TO% in SEC play is among the worst in the conference and that should play to one of Georgia’s strengths in terms of fast break points. It should also help this game from a pace perspective. But, I also expect Tennessee to get to the free throw line a lot and they do have size advantages on the interior to get easy buckets and second-chance points.
Pick: Over 159.5
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