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No time to contemplate or celebrate Monday, Mar 17, 2008 By Harry King ATLANTA - There was no time for Georgia players to savor or their fans to appreciate the Bulldogs' Southeastern Conference Tournament title and that's a shame. Maybe the SEC and other conferences should finish up on Saturday. Both the Pac-10 and Big East played their championship game on Saturday, providing a window for celebration by UCLA and Pittsburgh and an opportunity for retrospective by Stanford and Georgetown. The way it is, by Sunday evening the ceremonious disclosure of the NCAA Tournament bracket trumps all else. For Georgia, the lag time was even briefer than normal to celebrate a glorious, out-of-the-blue championship. A storm on Friday night pushed back the semifinals to Saturday night so the tipoff for the final was moved back 2 1-2 hours. Officially, Georgia 66, Arkansas 57 ended at 5:37 p.m. CDT, 23 minutes prior to CBS' production. For Arkansas, the less time the better to wallow in the blahs of losing to a team that dropped 11 of its final 13 SEC regular-season games. The loss was frustrating to Arkansas, but the Razorbacks didn't hurt like Arizona State and Ohio State, two of those knocked out by the Bulldogs' three victories in 29 hours. Arkansas coach John Pelphrey exited the post-game interview while the four No. 1s were being identified as North Carolina, Memphis, Kansas, and UCLA and retreated to a room down the hall to get the news. It came quickly, No. 9 Arkansas vs. No. 8 Indiana in Raleigh, N.C. on Friday. The winner gets No. 1 North Carolina. Slightly subdued because of Sunday's failure, Pelphrey said he had seen Indiana on TV a few times and mentioned freshman Eric Gordon and big man D.J. White by name. Once the matchups were announced, the talk was of seeds, sites, shooters, and size. Don't explain away the Razorbacks' loss to Georgia by offering that Arkansas plays up or down to the competition. At the same time, toss out that theory about Arkansas getting to Georgia's legs in the second half. Instead, consider these things: -Georgia is stouter inside than Vanderbilt or Tennessee. In the first half, there was a snapshot moment when Charles Thomas rebounded and Dave Bliss muscled it away from him. The same Arkansas team that accumulated almost three dozen offensive rebounds against Vanderbilt and Tennessee had one in the first half on Sunday. -Arkansas turned the ball over 15 times, including 14 in the first 28 minutes. -The Razorbacks shot atrociously from 3-point range, making 2-of-17. The Bulldogs were 7-of-15 from way outside and every one seemed important. Georgia, which led by 19 twice in the first half, could have folded a couple of times. Like Arkansas against the Commodores and the Volunteers, the Bulldogs held fast. In the second half, there was a Terrance Woodbury 3 for 43-34 and another one for 46-36. Sundiata Gaines made one for 49-36 and Billy Humphrey hit the biggest of all for 61-53 with 96 seconds to play. During the first two tournament games, Weems and Patrick Beverley were 13-of-40 from the field - a killer stat if not for contributions from every other Razorback who logged any minutes. On Sunday, Weems was OK, but Darian Townes couldn't back over Bliss without a tussle and Beverley was 1-of-7 from the field and Stefan Welsh was 0-of-3. Coaching for his job, Dennis Felton called time at 4:18 with Georgia in front 56-53 and the "Pig Soooieee" ran over the top of Georgia's cheer. Overly excited about an open baseline, Bliss took steps. With a chance to close in, Townes shot over Bliss and missed. After a wild to and fro, Gaines passed to Albert Jackson for a dunk. Ervin missed the front end of a one-and-one and then a 3. Gaines' penetration set up Humphrey's 3. Weems was short on a 3. Gaines missed a free throw, but the ball boinged long to Bliss who was blocked out nicely by Townes. At 20.8 seconds, Welsh was way short from outside and Vincent Hunter dropped the ball out of bounds. The game ended with a miss from long range by Hunter and Bliss' rejection of Townes. Those were meaningless moments, but typical. ---- Harry King is sports columnist for Stephens Media's Arkansas News Bureau. His e-mail address is hking@arkansasnews.com. |
