The 2012–13 Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball team represented Georgetown University in the 2012–13 college basketball season. They were led by John Thompson III and played their home games at the Verizon Center. They were a member of the Big East Conference. Prior to the January 12 game at St. John's, the team's second leading scorer, Greg Whittington, was suspended indefinitely for academic issues. With a 61–39 win over their rival Syracuse Orange on March 9, 2013, the team clinched their 10th Big East Regular Season Championship. Georgetown lost to 15-seed and tournament newcomer Florida Gulf Coast University 78–68 in the second round of the NCAA tournament. The team was ranked No. 8 in the final Associated Press Poll of the season and No. 17 in the postseason Coaches' Poll.
This was Georgetowns last season as a member of the original Big East Conference. It had been a founding member of the conference in the 1979–80 season and had remained a member for 34 seasons, but the conferences increasingly unstable membership and uncertain future and what Georgetown and the conferences other basketball-only members believed to be its focus on college football at the expense of the interests of its basketball programs led Georgetown and six other Big East members (DePaul, Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall, St. John's, and Villanova) to leave the conference after the end of the 2012–13 season. In 2013, they joined Butler, Creighton, and Xavier in forming a new Big East Conference for the 2013–14 season. The original Big East Conference then added new members of its own and renamed itself the American Athletic Conference for the 2013–14 season.
The final regular-season meeting of Georgetown and Syracuse as Big East rivals on March 9, 2013, set an attendance record at the Verizon Center of 20,972.Clarke, Liz, "Georgetown-Syracuse basketball series to resume in 2015–16," washingtonpost.com, June 10, 2014, 11:33 a.m. EDT
Season recap Without its three top scorers from the previous seasonKline, Brandon, "Georgetown vs. Florida preview, time, TV schedule, and more," dc.sbnation.com, November 9, 2012, 2:30 p.m. EST – Jason Clark and Henry Sims had graduated and Hollis Thompson had left school a year early to enter the 2012 NBA draft – Georgetown entered the season with no seniors on its roster; the roster included eleven freshman and sophomores, one more than the previous year. Returning were junior Markel Starks at point guard, sophomore Jabril Trawick at guard, junior Nate Lubick, sophomores Mikeal Hopkins, Otto Porter, and Greg Whittington, and redshirt sophomore Aaron Bowen at forward, and junior Moses Ayegba at center. The freshman recruiting class consisted of guard D'Vauntes Smith-Rivera, forward Stephen Domingo, and centers Brandon Bolden and Bradley Hayes. Junior John Caprio made the team as a walk-on guard for the third straight season, and freshman David Allen also walked on as a guard. Sophomore center Tyler Adams, sidelined early the previous season by heart arrhythmia, spent the season on a medical hardship waiver that allowed him to continue at Georgetown on a scholarship without counting against the team's scholarship total; relegated to the bench, he made the most of the situation, acting as a de facto assistant coach.Kilgore, Adam, "Georgetown’s Tyler Adams, his career cut short by heart ailment, gets one last start," washingtonpost.com, March 6, 2015.
Non-conference schedule
Georgetown's season had an unusual beginning. The Hoyas started off with a ranked opponent – No. 10 Florida, a team they had not faced since losing to the Gators in the 2006 NCAA tournament – in the Carrier Classic. The game was played on November 9 in front of a crowd of nearly 3,500 people, including Olympic gold medalist swimmer Conor Dwyer, Jacksonville Jaguars players Paul Posluszny and Laurent Robinson, and United States Navy and United States Marine Corps personnel, on a court set up on the flight deck of the U.S. Navy amphibious assault ship , moored at Naval Station Mayport in Jacksonville, Florida. On game day, there were concerns that weather would be an issue, with temperatures expected to drop into the 50s (Fahrenheit, between 10 and 15 Celsius) during the evening and a possibility that windy conditions and condensation building up on the court would interfere with game play. In the first half, with condensation creating ever more slippery conditions, the underdog Hoyas allowed the Gators to shoot 45.5 percent from the field, but also forced Florida into eight turnovers. Florida, meanwhile, used an effective zone defense to limit Georgetown largely to perimeter shooting, and the Hoyas shot only 35.7 percent from the field and made only three three-pointers. Nate Lubick and Otto Porter led Georgetown with seven points each, and Greg Whittington and Mikeal Hopkins grabbed four rebounds apiece. Florida's greatest lead was a 10–5 advantage, and the Gators held a 27–23 lead at halftime. While United States Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus conducted a reenlistment ceremony for U.S. Navy personnel on the ship's deck, game officials, staff, coaches, the players, and volunteers spent all of halftime and several minutes after the scheduled start time for the second half attempting to dry the court with towels, but condensation in the humid evening air nonetheless made the floor so slippery that both coaches reluctantly agreed to cease play and suspend the game for the sake of the players′ safety without beginning the second half.Piper, David, "Georgetown vs. Florida halftime score update: Hoyas tail Gators, 27–23, in defensive contest," dc.sbnation.com, November 9, 2012, 10:16 p.m. EST.Piper, David, "Georgetown vs. Florida cancelled due to condensation on the court," dc.sbnation.com, November 9, 2012, 11:05 p.m. EST.Anonymous, "Shipshow, Slipshow! Georgetown-Florida Game Cancelled At Half Because of On-Court Condensation," casualhoya.com, November 9, 2012, 11:35 p.m. EST.Long, Mark, "Georgetown-Florida called at halftime, wet court," Associated Press, November 10, 2012, 12:41 a.m. EST.Clarke, Liz, "Georgetown-Florida basketball game on battleship called after one half," washingtonpost.com, November 9, 2012. Although the teams discussed the possibility of resuming play on another date and possibly in another location,Feldman, Asher, "Georgetown vs. Florida: Billy Donovan says he's reached out to Hoyas about completing suspended game," dc.sbnation.com, November 20, 2012, 11:24 p.m. EST. a mutually acceptable time and place proved elusive, and Georgetown announced on November 28 that it would not agree to schedule the game's completion. The game was canceled, and did not count in the record of either team.Jones, David, "Florida, Georgetown won't complete aircraft carrier game," usatoday.com, November 28, 2012, 8:00 p.m. EST.
Georgetown followed this disappointing beginning to its season by participating for the first time in the Legends Classic, in which the Hoyas first played two pre-selected mid-major opponents at the Verizon Center in non-tournament "regional" rounds, then went to the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, to play in a four-team tournament for the Classic championship, while its two regional opponents went to play in a parallel tournament of four mid-major teams in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In the first regional round, Georgetown faced Duquesne for the first time since December 1995 – and only the second since December 1962 in a series the Dukes led 10–3 entering the game. The Hoyas defeated the Dukes despite a first half in which Georgetown shot 5-of-22 (22.7%) from the field and committed seven turnovers and a second half in which they committed 10 more turnovers. Three days later, the Hoyas beat Liberty in the second regional round. In his collegiate debut, D'Vauntes Smith-Rivera came off the bench to score a team-leading 19 points against Duquesne, followed by 11 against Liberty. Greg Whittington had 15 rebounds in the Duquesne game and finished with a game-high and career-high 18 points against Liberty in a game in which Georgetown shot only 2-for-15 (13.3%) from three-point range but outscored the Flames 34–10 in the paint, including 24–0 in the first half. Mikael Hopkins scored 13 points against both the Dukes and the Flames, while Nate Lubick also scored 13 against Liberty and grabbed eight rebounds. Struck in the head six minutes into the Duquesne game, Otto Porter sat out the rest of that game and the entire Liberty game with concussion symptoms.espn.com Anonymous, "Georgetown 61, Duquesne 55," Associated Press, November 11, 2012.espn.com Duquesne vs. Georgetown – Box Score – November 11, 2012 – ESPNespn.com Anonymous, "Georgetown controls paint to win without Otto Porter Jr.," Associated Press, November 14, 2012.espn.com Liberty vs. Georgetown – Box Score – November 14, 2012 – ESPN
The Hoyas moved on to the Barclays Center to face much tougher opposition in the tournament portion of the Classic, meeting No. 11 UCLA in the semifinals. Leading 31–29 at halftime, Georgetown opened the second half with a 12–0 run that gave the Hoyas their biggest lead of the game at 43–29. The Bruins fought their way back to a 59–53 deficit, but the Hoyas then outscored them 7–1 to extend the lead to 66–54 with 6:17 to play. Again the Bruins began to close the gap, scoring to make it 77–70 with 50 seconds remaining. They did not score again, however, and Georgetown hung on for a 78–70 upset victory. The Hoyas shot 18-for-30 (60.0%) in the second half and 30-for-55 (54.5%) for the game; they outrebounded the Bruins 40–31 and had eight blocked shots to UCLA's four. Markel Starks scored a career-high 23 points, and Otto Porter returned to action and made his first collegiate start, finishing with a double-double (18 points and 11 rebounds). Greg Whittington had 13 points, and Nate Lubick had 11.espn.com Anonymous, "Georgetown upsets UCLA in Shabazz Muhammad's debut," Associated Press, November 20, 2012.espn.com UCLA vs. Georgetown – Box Score – November 19, 2012 – ESPN