Kentucky falls behind and can't recover in road SEC opener at Georgia

ATHENS, Ga. — Slow starts against quality opponents are becoming a theme for Mark Pope’s first Kentucky basketball team.

The sixth-ranked Wildcats dropped their road SEC opener to Georgia, 82-69, on Tuesday night inside a vibrant Stegeman Coliseum in Athens.

UK — now 12-3 overall and 1-1 in SEC play — trailed the Bulldogs by 13 points at halftime. The Wildcats battled back and made the game as close as a five-point contest in the second half, but Pope’s team dug itself a hole it couldn’t climb out of.

UK has now trailed by double digits in the first half in five of its seven high-major games this season. Three of those — games against Duke, Gonzaga and Florida, all of whom were ranked in the top 10 of the AP poll at the time of the game — turned into wins.

Now, two of UK’s slow starts have been punished with losses, with the Georgia defeat joining the Christmas time humbling by Ohio State in New York City.

UK has also now lost three straight games to Georgia in Athens. UK’s last win at the home of the Bulldogs came in January 2020.

Georgia’s 47-34 halftime lead came as fifth-year guard Lamont Butler was the lone positive for UK’s offense.

Butler had 13 points on 6-for-8 shooting at the break. No other Kentucky player had made more than two shots in the opening period. Butler also led UK with four rebounds at halftime. He finished with 20 points to lead all scorers.

Fifth-year big man Amari Williams picked up three first-half fouls for Kentucky, and then a fourth just minutes into the second half. Fellow fifth-year big Andrew Carr also got himself into foul trouble: Carr had four fouls against him with more than 11 minutes still to play in the game.

Williams finished with just two points and five rebounds. Carr finished with six points and five rebounds.

Fifth-year wing Jaxson Robinson struggled on offense as well. He went 0 for 4 from the field, all on 3-pointers, in the first half. Robinson finished with five points on 1-for-5 shooting.

UK — which entered the game as the nation’s top team in offensive turnover percentage — was mistake-prone on that end all night long. The Wildcats, who had previously given the ball away on only 12.5% of their offensive possessions, committed 13 turnovers on the night against just eight assists.

Kentucky’s distance shooting woes returned in Athens. One game after the Cats lit up Rupp Arena with a 14-for-29 3-point shooting clinic against Florida, one of the best 3-point defenses in the country, Kentucky went just 6 for 25 from distance against Georgia, which also boasts a 3-point defense that ranks in the top 20 nationally.

There had been pregame concern over the availability of Kentucky fifth-year guard Koby Brea, who was fresh off a scintillating shooting performance in Saturday’s home win over Florida team to start SEC play.

Brea — who torched the Gators to the tune of a career-best 23 points and seven made 3-pointers — had been listed as questionable to play for the Cats in a pregame SEC injury report. By tipoff, Brea — who didn’t practice with UK on Monday — was off the injury report.

“He’s pretty much up to speed on the scout,” Pope said on pregame radio of Brea, who went through a lighter-than-usual workload during Kentucky’s warmups Tuesday in Athens.

Brea checked in for Kentucky following the first media timeout of the first half. He had three points in the first half on 1-for-5 shooting, including 1-for-4 shooting from 3. Brea finished with six points on 2-for-10 shooting from the floor, including a 2-for-9 mark from long range.

Georgia established its ultimately decisive first-half lead without relying on high-scoring freshman forward Asa Newell. The 6-foot-11 Newell entered Tuesday’s game as the Georgia leader in points (15.4) and rebounds (6.9) per game.

The former five-star recruit had only five points and one rebound in the first half. Newell finished with 17 points and seven rebounds.

UGA went a perfect 12 for 12 from the foul line in the first period, compared to UK’s 2-for-3 foul shooting in the first 20 minutes. Georgia ended the contest with a mammoth 38-19 disparity in free throws attempted.

Former Kentucky signee Somto Cyril — a 6-foot-11 center who was the first class of 2024 recruit to commit to John Calipari and the Wildcats — had another strong performance for Georgia in what’s been a stellar freshman season so far.

Cyril, who fouled out, finished with six points and a game-high eight rebounds. He was a plus-13 in 18 minutes on the court.

Cyril decommitted from Kentucky during UK’s offseason coaching change from Calipari to Pope, before closing his second recruitment by pledging to play at Georgia.

Originally from Nigeria, Cyril, who was a four-star recruit, averaged 5.9 points, 4.7 rebounds and 2.0 blocks in 15.6 minutes coming off the bench for Georgia in nonconference play. He struggled in the Bulldogs’ SEC opener. In Saturday’s loss at Ole Miss, Cyril scored one point, grabbed four rebounds, registered a block and committed two turnovers.

Cyril showed big improvement from that outing against the Cats.

Kentucky can at least take a positive from some of Tuesday’s events around the SEC: Saturday’s home win over Florida has already started to age well.

Now ranked No. 8 in the nation, Florida dispatched No. 1 and previously unbeaten Tennessee, 73-43, in Gainesville on Tuesday night in a statement performance.

The Volunteers were the final remaining undefeated team in men’s Division I college basketball.

Kentucky will next play at No. 14 Mississippi State on Saturday night in Starkville. Mississippi State entered its SEC road game at Vanderbilt on Tuesday with a 13-1 overall record and a 1-0 mark in league play.

Head coach Chris Jans’ team has only lost once so far this season: A 10-point neutral-site defeat to Butler during a Thanksgiving Week tournament in Arizona.

UK has defeated Mississippi State in 18 consecutive regular-season games.