Georgia begins its quest for a third straight trip to the NCAA Tournament on Monday with a matchup against North Carolina Central in Athens, Ga.
The Bulldogs hope to continue to show growth in a program that has improved in each of coach Mike White’s four seasons. The Bulldogs have won 78 games — the most for any Georgia coach over his first four seasons — and improved their NET and KenPom rankings each year.
Last season, the Bulldogs reached the 22-win mark for the first time since 2002 while finishing 33rd in the NET rating and 35th according to KenPom. They earned a No. 8 seed in the NCAA Tournament — only to fall 102-77 to Saint Louis in the opening round.
“We want to get back to the NCAA Tournament,” White said. “We feel like we’ve got a chance to get back, and the next step is to play better when we get there. There’s no reason we can’t do that. We expect to do that, and I hope our fans have the same expectations.”
The Bulldogs were picked to finish 11th in the Southeastern Conference media poll. They finished 2-1 in exhibition games, beating Georgia State and Charlotte before losing to Clemson at the buzzer.
Georgia is one of the rare teams to welcome back three double-figure scorers: Blue Cain (13.1 points per game, 5.1 rebounds per game), Kanon Catchings (11.6 ppg, 4.8 rpg) and Marcus “Smurf” Millender (12.0 ppg, 4.1 assists per game).
To buttress his six returning players, White brought in five transfers and four freshmen. The most experienced is James Scott, a 6-foot-11 senior who has played at Charleston, Louisville and Ole Miss and enters the season with the best career field-goal percentage (75.9%) among active Division I players. He averaged 3.9 points and 4.6 rebounds for Ole Miss last year.
Brady Dunlap, who scored 11 points against Georgia in last year’s NCAA Tournament first-round game, has transferred in from Saint Louis. The Bulldogs also added Freddie Dilione V (14.0 ppg for Penn State) and rim protector Andrew Osasuyi (3.7 ppg, 1.7 blocks per game for St. Bonaventure).
North Carolina Central went 14-18 last season and lost to top-seeded Howard in the MEAC tournament final. The Eagles were picked by the league’s coaches and sports information directors to finish fourth this year despite retaining just one player: senior guard Ryan Archey (3.2 ppg).
Veteran coach LeVelle Moton, who begins his 18th season at his alma mater, focused on getting bigger. He signed five players 6-9 or taller, including Alabama State transfer Tyler Mason (5.0 ppg, 2.3 rpg) and freshman Duor Duor.
Senior power forward Christian Meeks (5.9 ppg, 5.8 rpg) came over from MEAC rival Morgan State.
“After last season, my staff and I agreed we needed to pinpoint heavily on positional size at every single position,” Moton said. “I believe we’ve accomplished that in this class, while also bringing in talented, skilled and determined individuals who are also high character young men and representatives of our basketball program.”
When these teams last met on Nov. 12, 2023, Georgia needed to score 35 points in the final 15 minutes to rally for a 64-54 win.
“This game is huge for us against a program that’s won a lot of games and is always competing at the top of their league,” White said.