Georgia Basketball: Making free throws is the biggest takeaway from 1st SEC victory

Georgia basketball broke its eight-game losing streak and finally got its first SEC win on Tuesday night as the Dawgs beat Alabama 82-76.

The biggest thing to take away from the Dawgs’ big victory is that they need to keep drawing fouls and making their free throws.

Alabama played their game in the first half as they led 42-36 at the half, making six three-pointers, but the Dawgs regrouped at halftime to outscore the Tide 46-34 and win by six.

Of those 46 second-half points, Georgia scored 20 of them from the foul line, while only seven of Alabama’s 34 points came from the free-throw line.

Georgia basketball needs to keep drawing fouls and emphasizing free throws if they want to keep winning.

Alabama may have outscored the Dawgs in the paint, second-chance points, and fast breaks, but the Tide couldn’t match Georgia at the line down the stretch.

After shooting 53.6% from the field in the first half, Alabama’s numbers dropped to 35.3% in the second, and it wasn’t like Georgia was making more shots. Their shooting percentage went down too.

The Dawgs shot 46.4% and dropped to 42.9% in the second half. Alabama limited the Dawgs to seven foul line appearances in the first half but got away from that strategy after halftime.

Georgia went from 4-of-7 to 20-of-23 in the second half, which gave the Dawgs more opportunities to score points where they are comfortable doing so.

Even though Alabama led in more stat categories, the Dawgs turned the ball over less and scored 23 points off the Tides’ 19 turnovers. Georgia’s bench also came in clutch for them by scoring 29 points.

However, the biggest takeaway is that the Dawgs played it smart by not giving up silly fouls.

Georgia drew 23 fouls Tuesday night. Jabri Abdur-Rahim led the team with seven of them, Aaron Cook drew five, Tyron McMillan and Christen Wright drew three, Braelen Bridges and Kario Oquendo drew two and Jaxon Etter rounded it out with one.

Abdur-Rahim went 10-of-11 from the foul line, making nine of the ten in the second half. Cook went 4-of-5, making all four down the stretch of the game when Georgia needed him to be clutch.

At one point, Alabama held Georgia scoreless for over two minutes, and flashbacks of other mid-game collapses surfaced, but instead of panicking, the Dawgs drew fouls and scored points that way.

Georgia went 16:55 without missing from the foul line in the second half and was 10-of-11 when the Dawgs missed their first free throw. That miss didn’t phase the Dawgs as they then went 10-of-12 from the free-throw line in the final three minutes while Alabama went 5-of-7 in the final 5:30.

It’s not like Georgia only made free throws down the stretch, but when they hit the line, they made sure to make them count.

The Dawgs need to continue using this strategy because it works. Head coach Tom Crean has a squad that knows how to use the foul line. Not many teams can do this consistently, yet Georgia can as they lead the SEC in free throws.

While it doesn’t seem that much, the Dawgs scored six more points at the foul line, which is how much they won by, so it may seem cliche to say, but making those free throws was the difference-maker in this SEC matchup, specifically the second-half free throws.