Maten carries Georgia to upset of No. 18 Tennessee

Senior forward Yante Maten once again carried Georgia to an upset in Southeastern Conference play as the Bulldogs knocked off No. 18 Tennessee 73-62 Saturday evening at Stegeman Coliseum in Athens, Ga.

After scoring 23 points in an overtime win at Florida his previous game, Maten came back with 19, as the Bulldogs (15-11, 6-8 SEC) knocked off the conference’s second-place team for a second straight outing. Forward Derek Ogbeide added a season-high 16 off the bench.

Guard Lamonte Turner scored 14 points and forward Kyle Alexander had a double-double with 10 points and 13 rebounds for the Vols (19-7, 9-5).

Georgia pulled away from a two-point halftime lead out to a 10-point cushion, 38-28, in the first three minutes of the second half and was still up 46-37 with 11:21 left in the game before Tennessee began chipping away.

The Vols got within 51-49 at the 7:35 mark, but fell back 57-51 over the next couple of minutes, and Georgia rode out the win. Guard Tyree Crump’s 3-pointer gave Georgia a 62-54 lead with under two minutes to play.

The two teams struggled mightily trying to get shots to fall in the early going. It was 8-8 after nearly nine minutes had been played.

Approaching the six-minute mark of the first half, the Bulldogs and Vols were a combined 10-of-38 (26.3 percent) from the field, and Georgia was clinging to a 15-10 lead.

But the two teams both began finding the mark with some regularity in the remaining time, and the Bulldogs went to the locker room up 28-26 at the break after leading 21-12 with under five minutes left in the period.

Georgia was 8-of-23 (34.8 percent) for the first half to Tennessee’s 11-of-29 (37.9 percent). The 26 points were a season low in a first half for the Vols, who ended up shooting 34.9 percent for the game to Georgia’s 42.6.

–Field Level Media