Land of free? Dawgs' season dies on wrong side of line

Which, of course, they did. Again. Again. And again.

"Style of play has a lot to do with it," explained Xavier coach Sean Miller. "Their big guys had to guard our forwards ... and that was to our advantage. That was one of the reasons they went to a 1-3-1 as much as they did in the second half to get away without fouling us.

"But we didn't do to Georgia anything different than we've done to a lot of teams this season. Being able to attack the basket and get to the foul line is something that all teams do. That, and the fact that at the end of the game they had to foul us on purpose, made it much more lopsided than it really was."

Josh Duncan and Derrick Brown were particularly effective on offense, while Dante Jackson threw in a huge 3-pointer with 7:21 left to break a 49-49 deadlock. And while Stanley Burrell contributed almost nothing on offense, he helped shut down Georgia star Sundiata Gaines and force the second-half mistakes that, in the end, toppled the Bulldogs.

But when you dissect the box score you can't get past what happened at the foul line. Or, in Georgia's case, what didn't happen.

"I don't know if Sundiata ever had a game where he couldn't get to the free-throw line," said Felton. "And it wasn't because he wasn't playing aggressively or not attacking the game."

Felton's memory is as inaccurate as the Bulldogs' second-half shooting. Gaines did have a game this season where he didn't try a free throw. In fact, he had two -- back-to-back early against Wisconsin and Delaware State.

But then he went 28 in a row before getting blanked. No wonder his coach didn't remember.

"All I can say is that I felt like the difference in the game was the fact that they were good enough to get to the free throw line 29 times to our five in the second half," said Felton. "Clearly, that was the difference in the game.

"We kept them off the offensive glass, which was critical. But they didn't ... we didn't put ourselves in position to foul them because we were giving up offensive rebounds. Whether it was the officiating or not, I just ... we really worked at being aggressive and attacking the paint with hopes that we could get points there."

It didn't work. It did for Xavier. End of story, but not end of the debate.