How 'bracketologists' size up Georgia basketball's NCAA tourney chances as SEC play starts
The College Football Playoff national championship game won’t include an SEC team for the first time since the 2014 season.
So the timing couldn’t be better for the SEC to tip off its conference hoops season Saturday with a full slate of games including Georgia basketball at Missouri.
The conference is in good shape more than two months out for more than half of its teams to take part in March Madness.
Georgia, despite its 10-3 record and eight-game winning streak, has a lot of work to do to break its NCAA tournament drought dating back to 2015.
“It's a good record, but there is no meat on the bones,” Jerry Palm, the longtime CBS Sports bracketologist, said via email. “They played a pretty poor schedule and lost their three toughest games. If Wake Forest is in the top five of their best wins at the end of the season, they probably won't get in (or WF turned out to be better than I expect).”
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The Bulldogs’ postseason profile includes no bad losses (Miami, Providence and Oregon rank from No. 45 to 53 in KenPom), just one top 100 win (No. 42 Wake Forest) and four wins against teams 258 or lower.
“They need to show they can beat tournament quality competition and ideally away from home,” Palm said. “In this case, if they can play well enough in the SEC to build up a tournament resume, they probably spent at least some time in the title race.”
Georgia will certainly have its chances to beef up its profile with 12 games still ahead against teams currently projected to make the NCAA tournament by ESPN’s Joe Lunardi. He has nine SEC teams making the field, the most of any conference.
“We’re talented, we’re deep, but the rest of the SEC is, as well,” second-year Georgia coach Mike White said. “So, we’ve got our hands full. Again, best league in the country. It’s the best it’s ever been. We’ve got to continue to improve.”
The Bulldogs will have a stretch of seven of eight games against teams projected to make the NCAA field starting Jan. 13 at home against Tennessee. It includes road games at South Carolina, Kentucky, Florida and Mississippi State. The Gamecocks, one of the big surprises nationally at 12-1, also play in Athens on Feb. 3.
Georgia gets Auburn in Athens on Feb. 24 and closes out the regular season on March 9 against the Tigers on the road.
“At least for us, we’ve played a handful of high-major games,” White said. “It prepares you to a certain extent, but the start of league play intensifies it for everybody.”
Shelby Mast, who does NCAA projections at bracketwag.com, also has 9 SEC teams in the field.
He said of Georgia, which he has as his eighth team outside the field: “Things are looking better for them this year, but to be a tourney team, they’ve got to win the games they should, losing the games they should won’t hurt them, but sneak a win vs one of the SEC powers would help, especially on the road.”
The road hasn’t been kind to Georgia in SEC play the last two seasons, going 1-17, but Georgia won at Florida State in its only true road game so far this season.
Georgia ranks 99th in the NCAA’s NET metric. That ranks 11th among SEC teams through Tuesday’s games.
The Bulldogs are 0-1 in Quadrant 1, 1-2 in Quadrant 2 and a combined 9-0 in Quadrant 3 and 4. Those are based on quality wins and losses by NET ranking and game location.
“We’ve put up some of that computer stuff, Quad 1, Quad 2, 3 and 4, all the analytical stuff, the KenPom numbers, we did all that in the preseason,” White said. “Probably as much as we’ve ever done. Just to get that out of the way.”
White said before the end of nonconference play “there’s going to be a bunch of teams in our league,” that will play in the NCAA tournament.
“I don’t think most people out there have us pegged to go right now,” he said, “but we’re going to get tons of opportunities if we continue to develop and grow together within league play.”
This article originally appeared on Athens Banner-Herald: The work ahead for Georgia basketball to end NCAA tournament drought
