SEC Hoops Shakeup: Georgia Rises, Kentucky Exposed, Alabama Rolls

A wild SEC opening weekend delivered everything we love about college hoops: statement wins, late-game heartbreak, and stars rising under pressure. We kick off with Georgia’s surge to No. 18 and a heart-in-throat overtime win over Auburn, powered by Jeremiah Wilkinson’s fearless shot-making and Somto Cyril's shot-blocking clinic. It wasn’t perfect—Auburn pummeled Georgia on the glass and forced extra time with a buzzer-beater off an intentional miss—but Georgia answered with poise and execution that felt like a program turning a corner. The we do a look ahead to Florida-Georgia on Tuesday, a rebounding war that will test the Bulldogs’ growth where it matters most.

From there, we shift to Alabama’s surgical three-point onslaught against Kentucky. Aden Holloway and company punished slow screen navigation and shaky closeouts, exposing a Kentucky team still searching for flow, health, and rhythm threes. We break down why nine assists is a red flag, how ball movement should climb, and what it will take for the Wildcats to look like their payroll. Vanderbilt keeps stacking wins and remains unbeaten, setting up a truth-serum test against Alabama to gauge spacing, shot quality, and defensive resistance against elite tempo.

We also spotlight Arkansas’ late-game toughness in a gritty win over Tennessee, where ten blocks and clutch execution turned a tight battle into separation. And in Austin, Mississippi State edged Texas in an overtime classic behind Josh Hubbard’s 38, a reminder that shot volume and confidence can bend a game when the margins tighten.

We close with quick Georgia football notes—CJ Allen and Christian Miller heading to the NFL.

If you’re here for smart breakdowns, matchups that matter, and the fine details that decide March in January, you’re in the right place. Tap follow, share with a fellow hoops fan, and drop your pick: who’s the real SEC frontrunner after this week?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:12

This is Sports Takes with Nate Skates, no spin, just straight sports.

Georgia’s Historic Start Under The Microscope

Auburn Rematch Context and Pettiford History

Wilkinson’s Breakout And Georgia’s Supporting Cast

Final Minute Collapse And Overtime Response

Florida Preview And Rebounding Concerns

Alabama Outshoots Kentucky From Deep

Vanderbilt’s Surge And SEC Hierarchy Watch

Arkansas Closes Strong Against Tennessee

Mississippi State Edges Texas In OT Thriller

Georgia Football Departures And CFP Preview

Closing Thoughts And Listener Prompts

SPEAKER_01 0:21

SEC play is underway in college basketball, and it was a big first weekend with overtime games, upsets, and incredible performances. You know it was a big weekend when two players go for 31 and 34, and neither one of them was the leading scorer in the conference. But before we get into Saturday's games, the new AP Top 25 poll is out. Five SEC teams are in the rankings. Vanderbilt leads the way at number 11. But how about Georgia? The Dunkyard Dogs moved up five spots to number 18. This is Georgia's highest ranking since the 2002-2003 season. It's also Georgia's hottest start since the 1930s. And if you are a Georgia basketball fan, did you ever think you would see the day that Georgia is ranked higher than Kansas? Florida dropped out of the rankings after losing this weekend. Did you think you would see the day Georgia would be ranked and Florida would not be ranked? Georgia is ahead of a lot of teams that are blue bloods, have won national championships. So this is early, but this is a historic start for Georgia, and we should all be very excited about what Mike White and the dogs are doing if you are a Georgia fan, because this is the good old days right now for Georgia basketball. They were number one in the country in scoring, uh, ranked very highly in a lot of statistical categories. But the question was would Georgia be able to keep up that pace in SEC play? Georgia's out-of-conference schedule was not the most difficult. They had games against teams like Florida State, Xavier, Georgia Tech, uh Cincinnati. So it wasn't a pushover schedule, but probably the toughest team Georgia played was Clemson, who they lost to in overtime. So going into Saturday, there was some concern about whether Georgia would be able to hold up against a team like Auburn, who was a number one seed in the turn NCAA tournament last year, won the SCC, and had a five-game winning streak against Georgia, had two games last season. You had the heartbreaking loss for Georgia in Athens last year. The comeback falls short. We have a chance to win the game at the end. Tip in from Asa Newell doesn't go in. In that game, Tahod Petiford torched the dogs, had 24 points, five of seven, three-point shooting. The game at Auburn, Auburn won that game by 12 points, and Tahod Petiford only had two points. Their head coach Steven Pearl said he wishes he could put Petiford in a hotel room for home games because of how much better he is on the road than at home. We saw that again Saturday when Petiford came off the bench and gave the dogs fits again, going for 25 points. And I was saying during the game, I have seen quite enough of De Hod Pedderford in Athens. I would be very happy if Mr. Pederford decides to go to the NBA or transfer somewhere else or decide he doesn't want to come to any more games in Athens. I have seen quite enough of that. However, Georgia also had its own guy playing out of his mind in Jeremiah Wilkinson. Now, if you don't know who Jeremiah Wilkinson is, he transfers in to Georgia this season, was the ACC's sixth man of the year. He has been phenomenal for the Dogs. On Saturday, he was very determined to prove he could play in the SEC. He's a hometown guy from Powder Springs, Georgia. He wanted to prove he could play in the SEC. And he definitely proved he can play in the SEC. Wilkinson had 31 points on the day. The first half of the game was kind of the Peterford versus Wilkinson show. Wilkinson also had six rebounds, and he made some huge plays that we'll talk about here in a second. Smurf Miller, who, by the way, I just learned Saturday, is actually five feet eleven. I thought he was like 5'8 watching the games, and obviously they're calling the guy Smurf. No, he just looks small compared to all the other basketball players. So Smurf Millinder is actually taller than me. But Millinder had 24 points, made some huge threes for Georgia. I love how Millinder shoots. He is never afraid, hits clutch threes every game. Samto Surreal was fantastic for Georgia again. 15 points, pretty much all of those are dunks, six rebounds, five blocks. We'll talk about that later. And there are some other guys who played really well who we'll talk about that in a minute. But the first half was really the Wilkinson Peterford show. Peterford seemed in the first half like he just could not miss. Meanwhile, Wilkinson was doing everything for the dogs. And he had 18 points in the first half, including the insane buzzer beater shot off the top of the glass before halftime. In the second half, it was a crazy back and forth game. Blue Cane showed up really huge for Georgia in the last few minutes of the second half. He ended up with 15 points. Georgia had a nine-point lead at one point in the game. Auburn closed that and made it close pretty much the rest of the way. But the last minute of the second half was terrible for Georgia. You are up, they were up five points with about 12 seconds left. Hall drives to the basket for Auburn and Surreal fouls him with 6.4 seconds left. Okay, but then it gets worse. The final possessions of the game, Georgia's up 92.88 with just about five seconds left. All you have to do is not foul, and the game is over. Hall comes down the court and the dogs are not giving him any space. Wilkinson gets called for the foul. I do want to say I thought that was a terrible call. I watched the play a few times. I just don't see a foul. Uh Wilkinson goes by the front of Hall without touching him. Then he goes from behind Hall and puts his arm up, but I don't even see any contact whatsoever on that play, except maybe until the ball is nearly to the basket, and if there's any contact there at all, it's his hand barely touching Hall's torso. I just didn't see a foul anywhere on that play. But Wilkinson needed to not contest the shot there. So what happens is the refs call a foul on the three-point shot. So Auburn has three free throws down four points with 0.7 seconds left. Hall makes the first two of those three free throws, then intentionally misses the last free throw. Aburn rebounds that ball. Overton gets a shot off, falling to the ground, and hits it to tie the game at the buzzer. And this really bit Georgia all game long, rebounding. Auburn won the rebounding battle going away. Specifically offensive rebounding. The Tigers more than doubled Georgia's offensive rebounds, 23 to 10. They had more total rebounds, 50 to 35. All those offensive rebounds, like that very last shot, were a very serious issue. Georgia has been a good rebounding team. They're known as a physical team. They did not rebound well. And Mike White talked about that after the game. He said, we're not going to win a lot of games getting letting the other team have a 23 to 10 edge in offensive rebounding. So that's something to watch going forward. But Georgia did answer very well in overtime. Wilkinson, as if he did not have a good enough game before overtime, hurts his ankle. If you were watching the game, you see him go down. With less than two minutes left, you really see him limping. He passes it, comes over to the corner, gets the pass back from Blue Kane, takes the shot from the corner while falling to the ground, nails a huge three, then he comes back with just under one minute left and hits a clutch step back three to go up four points. Wilkinson had seven in overtime. Wilkinson was interviewed after the game and he said he was practicing at Stegman Coliseum at midnight before Saturday's game. He said, those shots at the end of the game, it feels like I'm just shooting by myself, just trying to get a good shot, not settle and get what the team needs. Well, he looked like he was out there shooting by himself because he just about couldn't miss. Samto Surreal, meanwhile, in the course of one minute during overtime, had three blocks. He had two blocks on just one of Auburn's possessions. When Surreal got hurt early in the game, looked like he had a knee lower leg injury. I thought Georgia's season was ruined. I mean, the guy is too important for Georgia. Rebounding, blocks, dunks. He is absolutely critical to Georgia's success. And he is a he was a good defensive player last year. He is a drastically improved player this year. And for me, Georgia's success pretty well hinges on we got to keep this guy who plays really physically in the paint healthy. Georgia hangs on, wins the game. It's a heart stopping game and a sign of huge growth for Georgia. No, this isn't the same Auburn team as last year, but they are still a good team, and Georgia got a tough win. Last season, Georgia started SEC play with 51 points and a loss to Ole Miss. This year, albeit in overtime, they scored 104 on Auburn and one. That is a huge flip in one year. Going forward, Georgia has a game against Florida in Gainesville on Tuesday. This is going to be a very interesting, very physical rivalry game. It's always a tough rivalry game, but this year it's going to be even more difficult. Listen to these stats real quick. Georgia is fourth in free throws attempted. Florida is 16th. Florida is first in offensive rebounding, Georgia is 23rd. Florida is 10th in defensive rebounding, Georgia is 14th. Florida is first in overall rebounding, Georgia is ninth. Georgia is first in blocks, Florida is 30th. I gave you all these stats to paint the picture of this is going to be a very tough game. Both of these teams block shots, both of these teams go to the free throw line a lot. But the way Georgia struggled allowing offensive rebounds to Auburn, is that going to be a problem with Florida being the best offensive rebounding and best overall rebounding team in the country? With those big men, is Georgia with, you know, primarily you're leaning on Samto Surreal. Yes, you have Abson. Yes, you have Dylan James, but for Georgia, it's pretty much Samto Surreal. We're playing a smaller lineup, a lot of guards. Is Georgia going to be able to rebound with Florida? Florida, meanwhile, had another very close loss. They've already had narrow losses to Duke and Yukon earlier in the season, two of the better teams in the country. Had a narrow loss to Missouri at home Saturday, so they drop out of the top 25. So this is going to be a very interesting game Tuesday. Is Georgia going to be able to keep up this same level of success with a team that is that physical? You would obviously give the offensive edge, probably, as far as statistics goes, to Georgia. Georgia is the number one scoring offense in the country. But we're going to find out just how good Georgia is on Tuesday. Now, let's talk about one of the other marquee matchups from Saturday. That is the Kentucky Alabama game. Alabama is a premier SEC program. Nate Oates has built an incredible program at Alabama. Yes, they're only ranked 14th, but their losses are to Purdue, Gonzaga, and Arizona. They looked like a team that has only lost to Purdue, Gonzaga, and Arizona. The tale of the game to me was Kentucky could not limit Alabama's three-point shooting, especially in the first 30 minutes of the game. This is what we talked about on the show a couple weeks ago. I said Kentucky was not doing well on screens. They were not getting off the screens and they were leaving too many three-point shooters open. That was deadly for them all day Saturday. They were unable to get past the screens, leaving guys wide open. Alabama wasn't missing threes. This was not like the Indiana game earlier in the year for Kentucky. Alabama was hitting nearly 50% from three for the first 30 minutes or so of the game. Aidan Holloway went six for eight from three. Amari Allen was three for four, and Millette was four for six. Part of that is just they have good shooters. Alabama's a good shooting team. They're second in three points made. But at times, for Kentucky, there was poor closeout defense, they're biting on too many shot fakes, and as I said, they're getting screened too much. Kentucky can't do that and win. Most people, most teams can't, but because Kentucky doesn't shoot threes well, other than the St. John's game, they aren't going to hit, they have not hit threes. So they cannot get in a scoring battle with Alabama. Kentucky did a great job fighting back, and they narrowed the lead down to nine with four and a half minutes left, which was a big accomplishment for how much Alabama had dominated the game. But then Alabama just ran away with it again. To me, Alabama just looked too quick for Kentucky, too polished for Kentucky. Kentucky had another poor shooting day, four for nineteen from three. And I don't think Kentucky wants to play Alabama again. And I what is the answer for UK? You're spending$22 million on players. You are outspending everyone. And this team just looks like they can't handle a team at Alabama's level. You heard Mark Pope say after the game, we're having good practices. They're listening in practice, they're doing what I want in practice. It's just not translating to the games. And then you hear Alabama's coach, Nate Oates, he sees it. He sees that Kentucky against good teams is not moving the ball well. They're not running their offense well. They're not getting very many assists. Kentucky just had nine assists on Saturday. That is not going to work. I understand that the Wildcats have had a lot of injuries. They are trying to get their lineup together. They're trying to get cohesion. But they're going to need that as the season goes on. And if you're a Wildcat fan, you know, maybe don't panic. Give them some time to be healthy, play together, see how it goes. But right now, it is not looking particularly great for a team that is so drastically outspending other teams and is used to high levels of success. So they are going to have to play better. Kentucky has Missouri at Ruperena on Wednesday, who is coming off the big win against Florida. Now, Vanderbilt, who is the highest ranked team in the SEC, had a yet another win against South Carolina on Saturday. Vanderbilt is 14-0. Neither the men's nor the women's team for Vanderbilt has lost the game this season. I think I saw their 29-0 combined. Vanderbilt's men's team has a wins over St. Mary's, Wake Forest, SMU, who is now in the top 25. Vanderbilt scores. They're 10th in points per game, 14th and made threes. Vanderbilt gets that win over South Carolina by 12 points. So they have a game against Alabama on Wednesday. Talk about threes. There's probably going to be a lot of threes on Wednesday night. This will be a very interesting game. We'll see a lot more about the SEC hierarchy early in the season, and we'll find out just how good is Vanderbilt now that they're going up against Alabama, who has consistently been one of the premier teams in the SEC the last few years. One of the other key games on Saturday was Tennessee at Arkansas. So Tennessee's kind of had an up and down season. They did have the wins over Louisville and Houston. Arkansas's also had a little bit of an up and down season. They have the wins over Louisville and Texas Tech. I went back, I did not see this game live. I went back and watched the condensed game. I thought that I had heard Tennessee had won the game. And so for the first 25 minutes or so, I thought, wow, Tennessee's playing really well. And clearly looked, oh, I understand why Tennessee won this game. Then while I'm watching the condensed game, I'm going and looking at the stats, and I see that wait, Arkansas won the game. So I honestly thought Tennessee had misprinted the score on their own website. But as I watched the rest of the game, it became apparent what happened. It was a very good back and forth game. Not great shooting, but a lot of good physical play, physical defense. Arkansas had 10 blocks in this game. That is a big part of how they won this game. 10 blocks. And Arkansas just took over the last four or five minutes of the game. They were hitting clutch shots, and they got it done. I mean, they just showed up clutch and won the game. And now, oddly enough, both Rick Barnes and John Calperry both have 846 wins. So how's that for a little factoid? Arkansas walks away with a huge 11-point win over Tennessee. Now, a game you probably didn't have circled, if unless you're a Mississippi State or Texas fan, was the Mississippi State game at Texas. That turned into an absolute classic, yet another overtime game in the SEC this weekend. So in that game, which Mississippi State won 101-98, the Longhorns were led by Dalen Swain, who went 10 of 18 for 34 points, 14 rebounds as well. But he was not the leading scorer in the game. The leading scorer in the game was Josh Hubbard for Mississippi State, who was six of seventeen from three-point range and had thirty-eight points. That was on ten of thirty one for shooting. So the guy was not afraid to take his shots during this game. Mississippi State gets a big win against Texas. Crazy game. We'll see how those two teams do going forward. Now, this was our first exclusively college basketball episode, and it was entirely SEC. If you are not an SEC basketball fan, I will probably start to get into a lot more basketball as college football season ends. It will probably be primarily SEC basketball, especially Georgia. And because I am surrounded by Kentucky Wildcats, we will also talk Kentucky. Some Georgia football news, though. Both middle linebacker CJ Allen and defensive lineman Christian Miller have declared for the NFL draft. This is not a surprise. I'm happy for them. CJ Allen is probably going to be a first-round draft pick. He was a first team All-American. Christian Miller has a good future in the NFL, probably. These are enormous losses for Georgia, who is not expected to have a lot of turnover from the roster this year. But CJ Allen, we talked about him on the show before. This he is a he is the leader of the defense. He has been so good from day one. He is a dog through and through, fought through injuries, played in that Georgia Tech game way sooner than anyone would have thought he would have been able to. Played phenomenally all year. We are going to miss CJ Allen. Christian Miller was carrying the Georgia defensive line and pass rush early in the season. He had a great year. He's been a great player for Georgia. We are going to miss these guys. We wish you the best in the NFL, guys. You are dogs for life. We love you. I do not know how Georgia is going to replace that, but Georgia always does it, particularly at linebacker. Just some of the linebackers Georgia's had over the last several years. I mean, you're talking Rokon Smith, Lorenzo Carter, Nicobe Dean, Quay Walker, Channing Tyndall. I mean, Georgia is a linebacker factory. And so we already have some guys. We have Chris Cole, we have some guys on the roster already who we are looking to who could replace CJ Allen. Right, Raylan Wilson has not declared for the NFL draft yet. So if he does not declare, you would expect him to take over for CJ Allen. So we will see how Georgia replaces this, whether they go to the transfer portal, whether we rely on in-house guys. Also in college football, on our next show, I will be talking about the Miami Ole Miss Fiesta Bowl, the semifinal in the college football playoff. That game is Thursday night. I will also talk about Oregon versus Indiana in the Peach Bowl, which is on Friday night. So I will try to have that episode out by Thursday morning to kind of give you a preview of those games. We will also talk about the Tuesday and Wednesday basketball games in the SEC and maybe give a little preview of the games coming up that weekend. So a little bit shorter show today. Hope you enjoy it. Let me know your thoughts. How'd you enjoyed the opening weekend of college basketball? If you are a Georgia-Kentucky fan or any a fan of any of the teams I talked about today, let me know what you think about those games, my analysis of your teams. And if you're a dog, we had a bad week with the Ole Miss Lost, but this is a day to celebrate. Number 18. That is a huge accomplishment for Georgia and Mike White. We are going in the right direction. I'm really excited to see this team. And on Tuesday night, we have got the Gators. So go dogs.