UGA Sports: Olympics Postponement ‘Absolutely The Right Thing’

By John Frierson
Staff Writer

The inevitable happened Tuesday when the International Olympic Committee announced that the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, set to begin in late July, were being postponed to 2021 due to the coronavirus pandemic. The news, which most everyone saw coming in recent days, affects elite athletes around the world, including many current and former Georgia Bulldogs.

Jack Bauerle, Georgia’s Tom Cousins swimming and diving head coach, said the postponement was “heartbreaking,” but at the same time it was “absolutely the right thing to do.” The disappointment felt by young and healthy athletes, he said, and the problems and challenges the postponement creates, pale in comparison to what’s happening around the world.

“This is the Olympics and its fixable,” Bauerle said Monday after word spread that a postponement announcement was coming, “but for so many others, this is real life and what’s happening is catastrophic.”

Bauerle isn’t able to work with any of his current swimmers since the NCAA suspended all athletic activities, but he has a group of 12 postgrads, professionals, some of them among the very best in the world, that he’s been working with every day, safely, at a pool in Atlanta.

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UGA Men’s Basketball: Edwards Earns NABC Honor

ATHENS, Ga. — Georgia’s Anthony Edwards was named second-team All-District by the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) on Monday. The honor includes players from SEC teams.

Edwards, a 6-5, 225-pound Atlanta native, finished the 2019-20 season as the nation’s leading scoring freshman. He averaged 19.1 ppg and scored in double figures in 27 of 32 games, including 14 20-point outputs and three 30-point performances. Edwards scored 610 points total, a tally that ranks No. 7 in Georgia’s all-time, single-season scoring leaders and No. 10 among the SEC’s top scoring efforts by a freshman.

Edwards also made a significant impact among Georgia’s single-season record book. In addition to the No. 7 scoring effort, he put up numbers that rank No. 19 in scoring average (19.1 ppg), No. 11 in 3-pointers (72), No. 2 in 3-point attempts (245), No. 5 in field goal attempts (505), No. 17 in free throws (132) and No. 19 in free throw attempts (171).

Last week, Edwards announced his intentions to declare for the 2020 NBA Draft, where he is projected by many to be the No. 1 overall pick. He was the first player listed on the NABC’s District 20 second team, which also featured Auburn’s Samir Doughty, Alabama’s Kira Lewis Jr., Kentucky’s Immanuel Quickley and Auburn’s Issac Okoro. Skylar Mays of LSU, Nick Richards of Kentucky, Reggie Perry of Mississippi State, Breein Tyree of Ole Miss and Mason Jones of Arkansas were the first-team honorees.

The NABC recognition just lengthens a long list of postseason accolades for Edwards. He was named SEC Freshman of the Year by league coaches and SEC Newcomer of the Year by the Associated Press. Edwards was a second-team All-SEC pick in balloting of both coaches and the AP and was named to the coaches SEC All-Freshman team. The U.S. Basketball Writers Association named Edwards to its All-District IV team as well, a geographic area covering teams from the states of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee.

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