Mike White has been on the receiving end of a lot of hate since Georgia's embarrassing exit from the NCAA Tournament. And no matter how big of a fan you are of White, he deserves every bit of it.
This year marked the second season in a row that Georgia has made the NCAA Tournament. That is a huge accomplishment for a porgram like Georgia, but for the second year in a row they were blown out in the first round. That is unacceptable.
White deserves all the blame in the world for those crushing defeats, but that still isn't the thing he deserves the most blame more. The thing he deserves the most hate for is the fact that he keeps losing all of his players to the Transfer Portal every offseason.
Mike White's inability to keep Georgia basketball's roster in tact is a growing concern
How can Georgia expect to make any noise in the NCAA Tournament if they have a brand new team every season? The easy answer is that they can’t. Losing guys like Jeremiah Wilkinson and Somto Cyril is just too difficult to overcome at a place like Georgia.
But that isn’t an acceptable excuse. White is responsible for everything that happens in the program, so if Georgia isn’t winning in the tournament because he has to keep rebuilding his roster from scratch then that is solely on him.
So what can White and Georgia do different? For starters they may need more NIL money. The fact that all of their good players leave for the portal every year may be a sign that they aren’t being paid enough.
On top of that, he just has to find a way to win in March. If he can lead Georgia on a deep tournament run that would make players want to stay and attract other transfers to come join the program as well.
At the end of the day Georgia basketball will never be Georgia football. No one actually expects this program to compete for championships like Kirby Smart does every year. But flaming out in the tournament isn’t acceptable, and if White can’t retain his roster then this might be Georgia’s reality every year.