Landers Wins No. 850 At Georgia

Release from Georgia Athletics:

Shacobia Barbee scored 14 points to lead four Lady Bulldogs in double figures in No. 22 Georgia’s 74-51 win at Tennessee Tech on Saturday night. The victory represented Andy Landers’ 850th win in 36 seasons as the Georgia’s first – and still only – full-time women’s basketball head coach.

“Let’s make sure we get the record straight,” Landers said. “These aren’t my wins. They belong to a lot of people. I’ve been at Georgia for 36 years so, yeah, that piece is mine. But the wins, the first one in 1979 all the way through tonight, those belong to a lot of people other than me.”

The win came against Landers’ alma mater. He received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Tennessee Tech in 1973 and 1974, respectively.

Landers becomes just the seventh college basketball coach – men’s or women’s – to record 850 victories at a single Division I school. The six coaches to reach that milestone are Pat Summitt (1,098 wins at Tennessee), Jim Boeheim (953 wins at Syracuse), Mike Krzyzewski (916 wins at Duke), Geno Auriemma (882 wins at Connecticut), Dean Smith (879 wins at North Carolina) and Adolph Rupp (876 wins at Kentucky).

Landers also is closing in on his 950th career victory. He now has 932 career wins including the 82 recorded from 1975-79 at Roane State, a junior college in Harriman, Tenn.

Early on, it looked like the Lady Bulldogs wanted to remove any drama surrounding the outcome. Georgia (7-0) raced to a 10-0 lead just2:35 into the game. For the next 20 minutes, the Lady Bulldogs got all they could handle from the Golden Eagles, who are coached by Landers’ longtime friend Jim Davis.

Georgia led just 31-25 at halftime and was up 44-35 with 10:06 remaining before a quick 9-0 scoring surge over the next 2:52 doubled that lead.

Barbee scored 12 straight second-half points for the Lady Bulldogs, the last five igniting the decisive push.

Merritt Hempe finished 12 points for Georgia, while Krista Donald and Tiaria Griffin chipped in 11 and 10, respectively.

Tennessee Tech (1-4) was led by Samaria Howard’s 14 points.

Georgia secured its largest lead of the first half at 17-5 with 14:59 left in the half following back-to-back layups by Mackenzie Engram. The Lady Bulldogs scored just 14 points in the rest of the opening period, however, and led by just six at the intermission.