ATHENS — Somewhere, one might imagine, Georgia men’s basketball coach Mike White was tuned into the final moments of UConn’s epic 19-point comeback win over Duke in the NCAA tournament on Sunday.

If White wasn’t watching live he surely soon learned that Silas Demary Jr., formerly a two-year starting point guard at Georgia, played a pivotal role in the Huskies’ win with 11 points, five rebounds and a deflected pass that led to the game-winning shot.

Demary Jr., Bulldogs fans know, was a UGA NIL casualty last spring when basketball-mad UConn lured the former Georgia team captain into its tradition-rich program.

White, of course, rebounded by landing a transfer class at Georgia strong enough for the Bulldogs to set a program record with 22 wins en route to their first back-to-back NCAA tournament appearances since 2002.

It was no easy task replacing a player like Demary Jr., who led the team in assists, steals, minutes played and was second in scoring to future first-round NBA pick Asa Newell in 2024-25.

Dawg Gone

It will also be challenging to replace this season’s leading scorer, Jeremiah Wilkinson, who entered the transfer portal on Monday after spending a season at UGA after arriving from Cal

Such is the world of college basketball, as more than 2,300 Division 1 players entered the spring transfer portal in 2025 — an average of more than six per team — per the South Bend Tribune.

White told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution last week he’s more focused more on roster management than budget.

This year’s basketball portal runs 15 days from April 7 - April 21 — down from 30 days last year, and 45 days in 2024.

“Every transfer portal cycle is essentially a chance to reshape your roster,” White said. “With the portal opening right after the NCAA tournament and being shorter, obviously everything will move faster.

“We have to be ready to evaluate quickly without ever losing sight of who we are and what we’re trying to become as a program.”

No doubt, White looks to make the most of roster management opportunities in the coming weeks in meeting with players and assessing talent.

The transfer portal doors will soon swing open, and in some cases, White notes, players are already considering their options.

“So many of these student-athletes playing in this tournament mentally might have a couple toes in the portal, they might have a foot in the portal, they might have a foot-and-a-half in the portal,” he said after the loss in Buffalo.

“They’ve got communication with relatives, with former coaches and now with agents, right? So, first and foremost, where are we at with our roster? Let’s try to figure that out as soon as possible.”

Financial decisions

Identifying players is one thing, but retaining players and acquiring new ones is another, and as with any program, there are financial decisions to be made.

The various published datapoints on NIL spending and operations budgets fail to provide enough detail to provide complete clarity, as NIL contracts are not subject to open records laws, and budget comparisons are challenged to take into account several variables unique to each program.

UGA athletic director Josh Brooks has indicated in the past that the Bulldogs’ basketball NIL spending has hovered “near the middle” in a league that sent a nation-high 10 teams to the NCAA tournament this season after a record 14 teams made the field last year.

White, himself, ranked 11th among SEC coaches in pay this season — a bargain when one considers the program’s ascension with a four-year win total 78 games — 12 more than any other coach began his career with in UGA basketball history, including 62 wins over the past three seasons tying the bench mark set by Hugh Durham from 1981-1983.

The Bulldogs fell short of achieving what would have been their first NCAA tournament win since 2002 — a win that was later vacated due to NCAA sanctions — falling to St. Louis 102-77 in a Midwest Regional first-round game in Buffalo, New York.

Faulty narrative

The social media reactions were swift and severe.

“Any time the ending isn’t what you wanted it to be, there tends to be a narrative,” ESPN basketball analyst Dane Bradshaw said during an appearance on DawgNation’s “On the Beat” podcast on Monday.

But, Bradshaw noted, in the final weeks of the season White’s Georgia team was on the proverbial NCAA tournament “bubble,” needing a strong finish in a deep SEC that produced 10 tourney teams just to make the field of 68 teams.

“When you’re on the bubble, teams can fold under the pressure or rise to the occasion,” Bradshaw said, “and I believe Georgia won five of six games to close out the season. They were playing as well as anybody in the country.”

The Big Dance music stopped abruptly, however, drawing immediate disappointment from a UGA fanbase that was among the record viewership — according to CBS Sports, the most-watched first-round ever.

White didn’t have the answers for the outlier performance: A shooting star going 0-for-11 from the field? A team featuring an All-SEC Defensive team post player getting outscored 66-28 in the paint?

March Madness had simply struck again, with White’s capable Bulldogs the victim of an upset in a game they had been favored in by a scant 2 1/2 points.

It was as surprising as seeing Georgia football, as a 1 1/2-point favorite, get bested by Notre Dame in the 2025 Sugar Bowl by a 23-10 count.

Then, like now, the answer was that more money was needed for a UGA sports program to acquire elite talent through the transfer portal to address a glaring need, in this case, the receiving corps.

Former USC wideout Zachariah Branch, acquired through the portal proved the right fix, answering the need with a record-breaking, single-season catch total that enabled Georgia football to repeat as SEC champions and reach the CFP quarterfinals — football’s version of the Elite Eight — once again.

UGA, in fact, ranks as the only program in the nation to have a football team make the CFP quarterfinals and a basketball team in the NCAA basketball tournament each of the past two sports seasons.

Different measures

But as most already know, football and basketball do not operate on the same plane in collegiate athletics.

A review of UGA’s financial report, obtained by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, revealed that $38.9 million of the athletic department’s $41.3 million in revenue from ticket sales came from football.

The math is simple: Football, with its large venues and high-television ratings — second only to the NFL — is a far more profitable venture when it comes to producing revenue to fund other sports in the athletic program.

Indeed, former SEC commissioner Roy Kramer once famously said that “Football is the engine that drives the revenue train.”

In that respect, no SEC football program has been more successful than Georgia in recent years in that respect.

Kirby Smart has won the past two SEC championships — and is the only active coach with an SEC championship to his name — along with winning the SEC’s two most recent national championships while churning out more NFL draft picks over the past five years than any program in the nation.

UGA reported a staggering $241.8 million in operating revenue for the 2024 fiscal year with a $47.5 million surplus, drawing a $1.16 billion sports valuation in 2025 per CNBC — up 22 percent from its 2023 value.

The eye-popping numbers and athletic department worth under Brooks’ leadership ranks fourth in collegiate athletics, per the CNBC, behind Texas ($1.48 billion), Ohio State ($1.35 billion), Texas A&M ($1.32 billion) and tied with Michigan.

UGA donations reflect the fanbase’s priority to maintain its place at the top in football, with $44.1 million directed towards football and $1.5 million designated for men’s basketball out of the $46.6 million reported in contributions.

A significant portion of the athletic department revenue must go back into the football program to maintain elite success — and it’s earnings potential — even as Brooks works to spread funds across other sports programs with hopes of providing each coach an opportunity to compete for championships.

White, through four seasons, has improved the win total each year in launching the most successful four-year start to a men’s head coaching tenure.

The basketball experience has been enhanced with students Fans often filled 10,523-seat Stegeman Coliseum averaging more than 80 percent capacity.

What Georgia needs

Bradshaw, who has a player at Tennessee (2004-07) was a part of a program that transitioned into an annual SEC and NCAA tourney contender, said Georgia basketball simply must get bigger to take the next step.

“I think they just have to add depth to that front court,” Bradshaw said, keenly aware of UGA ranking 14th in the league in rebounding margin in conference games.

“It’s fun scoring a 100 points and they were really good at it, but how can you not get punished on the boards?”

To Bradshaw’s point, Georgia led the nation with 19.76 fast break points and ranked fifth in scoring (89.4 points per game).

But Georgia, even with a 3.1 turnover margin that ranked 29th in the nation, could not compensate for the added possessions — via second- and third chance-points, that its lack of rebounding prowess afforded.

“You have to get some front-court help in there,” Bradshaw said. “Ultimately, to win in March and compete for an SEC championship, you’ve got to get two or three horses down low. It’s a man’s game …. And the SEC is as physical as they come.”

White left the door open on Georgia’s style of play, but he made clear the mentality of player he’ll be looking for when retaining and seeking talent.

“Our priority remains the same as every portal period, focus on keeping the players who believe in what we’re building at Georgia, while adding the right pieces who truly fit our culture,” White said. “That’s what we’ve done in the past, and I believe it has served us well. We will stay committed to that approach.”