ATHENS - An October wave of three suspensions, followed by the dismissal from the team of last year's leading scorer, made some wonder what would be left for Georgia's season.
Coach Dennis Felton insisted Georgia has the depth to overcome the hits to his roster, and his freshmen backed up his confidence.
Three freshmen scored in double figures and Georgia scored the first 21 points of the second half to break open a close game and beat Jacksonville State 107-65 on Friday night.
Jeremy Price scored 18 points, Chris Barnes had 14 all in the second half and Jeremy Jacob added 13.
A fourth freshman, guard Zac Swansey, led Georgia with 10 assists as the first-year players grabbed the spotlight in the season-opener for both teams.
``It was fun,'' said senior center Dave Bliss, who started but scored only 5 points in 13 minutes while watching Price and the other freshmen play.
``It's good to be able to have the game in control where we could try some different things and get some experience for those guys,'' Bliss said. ``We're going to need them.''
Rashaad Singleton had 16 points and 10 rebounds as the Bulldogs outrebounded the Gamecocks 62-39.
The showing of the freshmen was good news for Georgia (1-0), which needs help inside following the dismissal of forward Takais Brown, last season's leading scorer, from the team last month for a violation of team rules.
Another Georgia starter, guard Mike Mercer, and a top backup, forward-center Albert Jackson, are suspended for 15 and six games, respectively, for violations of the university's new attendance policy for student-athletes.
Jacksonville State (0-1) also was led by a freshman, Jeremy Bynum, who had 19 points as the Gamecocks' only scorer in double figures.
Billy Humphrey added 13 points as Georgia's fifth scorer in double figures.
Georgia outscored Jacksonville State 60-24 in the second half.
Georgia led only 47-41 at halftime before Price played a lead role in the 21-0 run over the first 7 minutes for a 68-41 lead.
Price (6-8, 270) replaced Bliss early in the second half and scored eight straight points, including jams on back-to-back possessions.
Most of Barnes' production came late in the game.
``I think they're establishing themselves as players we can rely on,'' Bliss said.
Terrance Woodbury and Rashaad Singleton each also scored back-to-back field goals in the run.
Jacksonville State coach Mike LaPlante said he was looking more for a style of play than a close score.
``I'm not worred about the score; you can lose by 10 or lose by 40,'' LaPlante said. ``We were trying to dictate the tempo. ... You've got to make a higher percentage of your shots.''
The Gamecocks were only 26-of-80 from the field (32.5 percent), including 9-of-43 (20.9 percent) in the second half.
Jacksonville State was 0-for-11 in the second half before 6-foot-11 forward Amadou Mbodji of Senegal finally scored on a 3-pointer with 13:33 left.
Jacob and Price were expected to see substantial playing time. The surprise Friday night was early foul trouble led to Swansey playing 26 miniutes.
``You can see the vision he has the the kind of presence he has,'' Felton said of Swansey. ``He's developing into an important part of our team.''
Senior point guard Sundiata Gaines picked up his second foul less than 5 minutes into the game and didn't play the rest of the first half.
``One reason our team was able to never feel any pain was because Zac did such a good job,'' Felton said.
Georgia withstood the Gamecocks' 7-for-17 shooting on 3-pointers in the half.
NOTES: Jacksonville State was making only its second visit to Athens and its first since the 1959-60 season, when it beat Georgia 56-45. ... Jacksonville State is 0-18 against the Southeastern Conference since 1995. ... The Gamecocks made only 3 of 13 3-point shots in the second half. ... Eleven Georgia players logged 12 or more minutes. ... DeAndre Bray, a 5-foot-6 guard from Atlanta's Mays High, scored 5 points with six assists for the Gamecocks.
Tuesday
May 21st, 2024
11:33AM
