Bulldogs take down Kentucky, 86-78, for first win in Lexington since 2009

LEXINGTON, Ky. – The Georgia Bulldogs took down the Kentucky Wildcats, 86-78, inside Rupp Arena for the first time since 2009 to move to 18-8 (6-7) on the season. Junior guard Blue Cain led the Bulldogs with 20 points and five rebounds in the win.

FAST FACTS
• The result marks the Bulldogs’ first win over Kentucky in Rupp Arena since March 4, 2009, when Terrance Woodbury’s 30-point performance led Georgia to a 90-85 win. Interestingly, the win came under the head coaching direction of interim head coach, Pete Hermann.
• On top of Cain’s 20 points, matching his best in conference play this season, Jeremiah Wilkinson, Smurf Millender and Somto Cyril followed closely with 19, 14 and 14 points respectively. Millender also had a season-best eight assists.
• Georgia rolled out a starting five of Blue Cain, Kareem Stagg, Somto Cyril, Smurf Millender and Kanon Catchings – the second consecutive game with this combination to start. Both Stagg and Millender made their second career SEC starts in the game.
• Tied at 31 with 3:39 left in the first half, Georgia went on an 8-3 run to close out the period and take a five-point lead into halftime. This marks the third time in the last six visits to Rupp Arena that the Bulldogs have led the Wildcats going into the break, and the first time since January 17, 2004, that Georgia held onto the halftime lead at Rupp for the win.
• The Bulldogs shot 45-percent from behind the arc in the win, the highest three-point percentage in conference play this season. Georgia also bested Kentucky in bench points (29-8), points in the paint (30-24) and points off turnovers (22-9).

KEY QUOTE

Georgia Head Coach Mike White

On the win…
“We had a lot of momentum to us offensively. Our execution with our continuities the last two games has been very good.It doesn’t hurt when you add Jeremiah [Wilkinson] to the lineup, another talented scorer and playmaker for others as well and a guy that’s hard to keep out of the paint. The formula for this one, as I told Chuck [Dowdle] and Scott [Howard] post-game radio, we did a lot of good things offensively in Norman: the shot selection throughout the game, the ball movement, the decisions with the ball. We had a few sloppy possessions, but overall, it was a pretty good offensive game. We wanted to have some carryover and just compete at a different level, rebound at a different level, defend shooters at a higher level. We played with a ton of intensity, and I thought our guys from the jump really sat down and defended.”

On any key contributors to the win…
“It’s funny. I told Chuck and Scott, it’s not like there were a couple guys or one guy to point at or a couple guys to point a. To steal your term, we were a really ineffective or inefficient defensively in Norman. It was a collection and it was the same thing with this win on the other end of the spectrum. I just thought offensively, we cut hard, we shared it, we made good decisions, we flew to the offensive glass. I don’t think there was just one guy that played great. I thought that we had eight or 10 guys play well and defensively, we were really connected. They hit some hard shots down the stretch. They obviously made it really interesting. They’re very difficult to defend, but the way that we were throwing bodies around with some of our wall-ups, some of the turnovers that we caused, just overall physicality was a big factor for us. We’re not the most physical team in the league, but to a certain extent, I thought we matched a lot of theirs. They got 15 offensive rebounds, and we got 15. Even some of their offensive rebounds, we were in there fighting. We were in for the most part, did a better job.”

UP NEXT
Georgia returns home to face the Texas Longhorns on Saturday, Feb. 21 at Stegeman Coliseum. Tip-off is set for 3:30 p.m. ET on the SEC Network, and the first 750 UGA Students at the game will receive a free ‘Spike Hat.’ Tickets for all Bulldog home games can be found on GeorgiaDogs.com.