NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Kentucky will play for its 29th Southeastern Conference Tournament championship on Sunday after the No. 16 Wildcats defeated Georgia 93-80 in the semifinals on Saturday.
No. 2 seed Kentucky (25-8) faces No. 1-seeded Texas A&M (26-7) on Sunday at Bridgestone Arena. The Aggies crushed LSU 71-38 in the other semifinal game.
"That was a great test; That was a war," Kentucky coach John Calipari said. "We got down and we didn't stop. We kept playing, but they didn't go away.
"We had to make big plays and big rebounds down the stretch to even think about beating them."
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Kentucky, which owns more SEC titles than all the conference teams combined, trailed throughout much of the game thanks to Georgia's red-hot shooting and the Bulldogs' work on the offensive glass.
It was not until 8:16 remained that Kentucky finally overtook Georgia 68-67 on a putback by freshman guard Isaiah Briscoe, who had been in Calipari's doghouse for most of the game.
"As a coach, he demands the best out of you and that's all he did," Briscoe said. "I appreciate him for pushing me to being somebody that obviously I didn't want to be in the first half.
"But in the second half, he got the best out of me and I performed."
Overhearing Briscoe, Calipari asked him if he appreciated his coach at halftime?
"Now that the game is over, yes," Briscoe said. "But at the moment ... no."
Until Briscoe's go-ahead basket, Kentucky had been in the lead for only 27 seconds. The score capped a 14-5 run over nearly five minutes. Senior forward Alex Poythress had six points; Briscoe had five.
Kentucky went on to stretch the run to 27-10 to grab an 81-72 lead with 3:28 remaining. Freshman guard Tyler Ulis, the SEC player of the year, led the balanced scoring with eight. Briscoe had seven and Poythress had six during the run.
From the time Georgia lead 62-54 with 13:00 minutes to play, Kentucky outscored the Bulldogs 39-18.
"Your job is to make sure you're prepared and in the NCAA Tournament, the more weapons you have, the more chance you have," Calipari said. "Foul trouble, bad play. It's not going to trip you up."
Murray led five Kentucky players in double figures with 26 points on 8-of-12 shooting. Ulis scored 25 and had five assists. Junior forward Derek Willis had 14 points, Briscoe added 12 and Poythress had 10.
Georgia (19-13) was led by sophomore forward Yante Maten with 20 points. Junior guard J.J. Frazier had 17 and senior guard Kenny Gaines had 16.
"They had won five straight games and had us beat most of the game," Calipari said. "They are an NCAA team."
Despite the outcome, things got off to a rocky start for Kentucky as Georgia jumped to a 15-5 lead less than five minutes into the game. Gaines scored eight of the Bulldogs' points and Georgia made 6-for-9 shots from the field.
At 11:54 in the half, Georgia was shooting 71 percent from the field. During a 34-point loss during the regular season, Georgia made only 22 percent.
But with Georgia leading 23-14, Kentucky went on a tear.
Murray scored the first four points and Ulis added the last six in a 13-5 run that cut the lead to 28-27 with 8:12 left in the first half.
Kentucky finally took the lead at 34-32 with 5:33 to play on a Murray 3-pointer. At that point, Murray and Ulis had scored 25 of the Wildcats' 34 points.
But to its credit, Georgia charged back and held a 49-44 halftime lead. That was one more point than the Bulldogs scored the entire game in an 82-48 loss to Kentucky on Feb. 9 in Lexington.
Georgia ended the half shooting 61.3 percent. Gaines was tops with 14 points and Frazier added 10.
Kentucky shot 45.2 percent in the half. Murray had 19 points. Ulis had 12.
NOTES: After Saturday's SEC Tournament win, Kentucky leads the series against Georgia, 121-26, including six in a row. ...Kentucky is 10-1 against Georgia in the SEC Tournament. The lone loss was the infamous 2008 game when a tornado forced games to be moved from the Georgia Dome to a nearly empty Alexander Memorial Coliseum on the Georgia Tech campus. ... Freshman guard Jamal Murray owns the school record for having made a 3-pointer in 33 straight games.
