A road awakening: Arkansas shakes doldrums, whips Georgia

BOB HOLT
ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE

ATHENS, Ga. - Corliss Williamson and Scotty Thurman were Arkansas freshmen the last time the Razorbacks had an SEC road blowout like they enjoyed Wednesday night at Georgia.
Arkansas' 74-54 victory over the Bulldogs before 7,112 fans at Stegeman Coliseum marked the Razorbacks' most lopsided SEC road victory since 1993, when they won at Ole Miss 85-63.
Last Saturday the Razorbacks lost at home to South Carolina 76-65, so it figured they would struggle on the road, not win by 20 points.
"We just had a miracle," Arkansas Coach Nolan Richardson said, smiling and shaking his head. "The way we've been playing, it had to be a miracle."
Arkansas, led by senior guard Chris Walker's 16 points, shot 49.2 percent from the field and had just 10 turnovers while holding the Bulldogs to 35.9 percent shooting.
But Bulldogs Coach Jim Harrick wasn't impressed by the Razorbacks.
"I don't think they played so well," Harrick said. "They're not a great team by any means. We just did not compete tonight."
Arkansas (10-6, 2-1) won its first road game of the season. The Razorbacks had been 0-2, with losses at Providence and Memphis.
The Razorbacks also have struggled to win at Walton Arena, where they are 5-3.
"We're unpredictable," Walker said. "You never know with us."
Walker said that against Georgia the Razorbacks "brought that intensity that we didn't have at home when we played South Carolina.
"We came out more focused. We had it in our minds that we came here to win, not just to play a good game."
Richardson said it was the best game Arkansas has played this season.
"We played real solid basketball," Richardson said. "We executed on both ends."
On offense the Razorbacks made sure to get the ball inside to freshman forward Alonzo Lane, and he responded with 13 points and a team-high six rebounds.
When Lane got the ball, he either made a strong move to the basket or got it back outside to Walker, freshman guard Joe Johnson (13 points) or sophomore guards T.J. Cleveland (10 points) or Teddy Gipson (10 points).
"Coach wanted us to go inside first, then look outside, not outside-inside," Lane said. "The way we played, it opened up a lot of shots for the guys on the perimeter."
Walker was 7 of 10, Cleveland and Gipson 4 of 8 each, and Johnson 5 of 12.
On defense, Arkansas rarely pressed, instead relying on its half-court man-to-man defense.
"We weren't reaching for the ball so much," Cleveland said. "We just played our man defense straight up."
Cleveland was on Georgia sophomore guard D.A. Layne most of the game and helped hold him to a season-low seven points on 3-of-13 shooting, including 0 of 5 on three-pointers.
Layne scored a career-high 29 points at Arkansas last season and came into Wednesday night's game averaging 17.5 points.
"We got Layne to press," Cleveland said. "And when you get a shooter to press, you can frustrate him and take him out of his game."
Richardson said the Razorbacks did a good job of denying Layne the ball after he brought it up court.
"If you let him spot up, he'll wear you out," Richardson said. "But he's not one of those guys who can put it on the floor and create his own shot, and we did a nice job of not letting him catch it where he could shoot."
Junior forward Anthony Evans led Georgia (7-8, 0-3) with 15 points. Sophomore guard Shawn Fields added 11 points and 10 rebounds for the Bulldogs, who lost their fourth consecutive game.
Arkansas closed the first half with a 10-2 run to take a 39-30 lead. The Razorbacks then opened the second half by outscoring the Bulldogs 13-4 to push their lead to 52-34 with 14:46 left.
Georgia didn't pull closer than 15 points the rest of the game and trailed by as many as 23.
"We finally were able to put two good halves together," Lane said. "We came out for the second half thinking it was 0-0 because we wanted to dictate how the rest of the game was played."
Lane seemed almost as unimpressed with Arkansas' 20-point victory as Harrick.
"We know we can win by 20 on any night," he said. "This is the way we know we can play the rest of the season."
Richardson certainly wouldn't mind a few more games like Wednesday night's, especially on the road where the Razorbacks have four of their next five games.
"We just hope we can continue to improve," Richardson said. "If so, maybe we can have a few more miracles in us."

This article was published on Thursday, January 13, 2000

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