CHARLOTTE, N.C.-Travis Leslie let it fly just ahead of the horn Friday night, a shot intended to prolong Georgia’s basketball season for at least five more minutes.
Unfortunately for the Bulldogs and the Southeastern Conference, that 28-foot heave came up a foot or so short, allowing the Washington Huskies to escape with a 68-65 victory in the second round of the East Regional at Time Warner Cable Arena. Isaiah Thomas led the winners with 19 points.
Georgia completed its second season under coach Mark Fox with a 21-12 record. Washington (24-10) moves on to face North Carolina on Sunday afternoon for a spot in the Sweet 16 next week in Newark, N.J.
Georgia appeared to have things well in hand in the opening half after a rare 3-pointer from Trey Thompkins, who led all scorers with 26 points, put the Bulldogs up 23-16 with 5:52 to play. But the Huskies scored the next eight points to grab a 24-23 lead, and the teams were tied at 28 at halftime.
Washington swiftly took control after intermission, however. Thanks partly to a follow-up dunk by UGA’s Travis Leslie that appeared to be wrongly disallowed for goaltending, the Huskies surged in front 37-32 by the first TV timeout of the final period.
That advantage soon grew to 40-32 on a trey from Darnell Gant.
At that point, Fox burned the second of his five timeouts and Leslie soon completed a three-point play to pull Georgia within 40-35.
But Washington’s Scott Suggs hit his second 3 of the night to move the margin back to eight at 43-35. Another Huskies bucket put the Bulldogs down 45-35 and caused Fox to call his third timeout.
Finally, in the final two minutes, Washington cracked a bit with an eight-point lead. A turnover, a couple of missed free throws and another Thompkins 3-pointer pulled the Bulldogs within two with 3.7 seconds to go.
The Huskies’ C.J. Wilcox then missed the second of two free throws, Georgia rebounded and hurled a pass to Leslie, who was running down the left side of the floor. He caught it, turned and fired a high-arcing shot that never made it to the rim.