Georgia basketball shooting for bracket boost at Arkansas

ATHENS — A road win at Arkansas on Wednesday night isn’t necessarily a “must-win” for a Georgia basketball team striving to build an NCAA Tournament resume.

But tipped at 21 in Fayetteville represents one hell of an opportunity for the Bulldogs (14-4, 2-3 SEC) to steal a road win in the ultra-competitive SEC.

Georgia was most recently projected as a No. 8 seed in the NCAA Tournament – one of 12 SEC teams currently projected in the field – according to ESPN bracketology expert Joe Lunardi.

The Bulldogs have an average rank of 31.8 across six popular metrics (NET, KenPom, Jorvik, KPI, BPO and SOR), according to a recent UGA release.

Beating the Razorbacks — UGA is a 1-point underdog and has lost seven straight at Bud Walton Arena dating back to a 60-59 victory in 2011 — would boost the Bulldogs’ postseason resume

Georgia, coming off a loss at no. 6 in Tennessee (74-56) last Wednesday and at home against no. 1 Auburn (70-68) on Saturday, will face an uncharacteristically cold Razorbacks (11-7, 0-5) team.

The Razorbacks spent six of the first eight weeks this season under first-year coach John Calipari ranked in the Top 25 on the strength of 11 wins against a schedule that KenPom.com ranks as the 46th toughest in the nation.

Arkansas is expected to be without freshman point guard Boogie Flandteam’s second-leading scorer (15.1 points per game) and assist leader (103).

Fland hurt his hand in the Razorbacks’ 71-63 loss to Florida on Jan. 11 and has struggled to come through the injury.

A 5-star recruit and McDonald’s All-American out of Archbishop Stepinac High School (NY) in the Bronx, Fland played 85 percent of the possible minutes and accounted for 25 percent of the Razorbacks’ shot volume.

Georgia’s only road win to this point was back on Nov. 15 when the Bulldogs beat Georgia Tech (8-11) 77-69 at McCamish Pavilion.

The road gets even rockier later this week for the Bulldogs, who dropped their first two SEC road games at No. 16 Ole Miss (15-3) and at Thompson-Boling Arena in Knoxville when they travel to play at No. 5 Florida (16-2) on Saturday.

Georgia’s tackle strength ranks just 76th – 12th among SEC teams – despite opening the league slate playing Top 25 opponents in the first five conference games.

Such metrics will take care of themselves as the Bulldogs wade deeper into SEC waters, but wins must be part of the equation for Georgia to make what would be its first NCAA Tournament appearance in 10 years.

Lunardi suggested last week that SEC teams could make NCAA tournament fields as a major, even with league marks as low as 7-11 or 6-12.

Of course, that’s not where coach Mike White’s thinking is as he works to identify and improve the team’s ball movement.

The Bulldogs rank last in the SEC in assists/turnover in league games, averaging just 7.8 per game.

However, Florida and Arkansas are tied for 15th and 16th in the SEC in league games in the steals category, which could provide optimism for Georgia’s backcourt.

Overall, White knows he has a talented UGA team that is in the midst of elevating the level of basketball culture, and a road win at Arkansas — or any SEC school — would go a long way toward that.