Georgia caught a break.

The team it met in Tuesday night’s SEC/ACC Challenge in Stegeman Coliseum in Athens was missing a few key parts to its game.

Hard to do any damage minus energy and focus.

They were there when Notre Dame battled three strong teams to the wire in the Players Era Festival Nov. 26-30 in Las Vegas.

But they were seen only in short spurts in a listless 69-48 loss to the Bulldogs.

Tired legs?

Maybe a tired psyche, too.

Tough losses can wear down teams and the Irish have now dropped five straight to fall to 4-5.

SUBSCRIBE TO INSIDE ND SPORTS TO STAY IN THE KNOW ON NOTRE DAME ATHLETICS

► MBB: Creighton completes a losing week in Las Vegas for Notre Dame

► MBB: No. 6 Houston proves to be too much for Notre Dame in Las Vegas

► MBB: Markus Burton's knee injury will hold him out on "week-to-week basis"

► Which potential CFP matchups for Notre Dame pass the eye and stats tests?

► Notre Dame football lands at No. 4 in the penultimate CFP rankings

Georgia is off to its best start in 18 seasons at 8-1, though it’s still unranked with the most notable victories coming against St. John’s and Georgia Tech — its loss to Marquette.

The Irish were still without their star guard, Markus Burton, for the fourth straight game, and there is no replacement coming off the bench to come close to covering his dynamic playmaking, defense and 20-point scoring.

So the Irish, who came into the game averaging 78.1 points a game, slowed the pace, scored their fewest points of the season and couldn’t keep Georgia close for most of the contest because of defensive breakdowns.

There were no remarks available from ND’s second-year head coach, Micah Shrewsberry. Reporters in attendance did not request him for a postgame press conference and no Zoom meeting with Shrewsberry was offered by Notre Dame.

The Bulldogs aren’t a finished product and were picked to finish sixth in the SEC preseason poll.

But the potential is there for a nice season, with a player like five-star freshman Asa Newell. Rivals ranked the 6-11 forward the country’s 13th best recruit, and he looked like it with a 20-point, 11-rebound performance that kept the Irish from ever making a serious run after the Bulldogs got out to a comfortable lead midway through the first half.

Notre Dame’s defense just couldn’t locate a spark. The Bulldogs came into the game averaging 15 turnovers a game and the Irish forced only five.

The Irish came in with plus-5 average in rebounding, but got beat up 40-27, including a painful 14-7 on the offensive end.

It all led to 63 shots for the home team to 52 for ND and a significant 19-5 edge in total assists for Georgia.

JOIN THE CONVERSATION ON THE INSIDER LOUNGE MESSAGE BOARD

CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO INSIDE ND SPORTS ON YOUTUBE

The most hopeful burst for the Irish came early in the second half. Trailing 41-24, the rally started with a three by Braeden Shrewsberry, who finished with 14 points, a point under his average, though he was just 6-for-16 from the field and 2-for-7 on threes. Guard Matt Allocco, held to five points on 2-for-8 shooting, hit a three following a Georgia turnover and the run continued when the Bulldogs started casting off 3-point attempts rather than powering inside where it built its lead and held a 38-26 edge for the game.

A five-point burst by Irish backup center Nikita Konstantynovskyi and a fastbreak bucket by Allocco whittled the difference to 43-39 with 13:05 to play. Georgia’s Dakota Laffew, who had 16 points, hit one of his four threes in nine attempts to push the Georgia lead back to seven at the 12:45 mark.

Notre Dame’s last chance to grab some momentum again came near the 10-minute mark. Trailing by six at 47-41 following a Tae Davis 15-footer, Notre Dame scored just a point over a five-minute span to fall behind 55-42 with 6:27 to go. The Irish never got it under 10 from there.

The Bulldogs defense gets credit for shutting down the 6-9 Davis in the second half. He had 11 points on 4-for-6 shooting in the first half but finished with 14 and 5-for-13 from the field.

Notre Dame shot 36.5% from the field, 12 points below its season average and was just 21.1% on threes (4-for-19). Georgia, meanwhile, was at 47% for the game – ND opponents had shot 41.6% coming into the game.

Looking for some help to overcome the loss of Burton’s offensive production, Micah Shrewsberry turned to 6-11 freshman Garrett Sundra. He was coming off an 11-point performance in the four-point loss to Creighton and had five points (2-for-3 from field) and a couple of rebounds in 21 minutes off the bench Tuesday.

Georgia’s bench outscored the Irish 23-10.

Notre Dame hosts Syracuse in its first ACC game of the season, Saturday at noon.

---------------------------------------------------------------

• Talk with Notre Dame fans on The Insider Lounge.

• Subscribe to the Inside ND Sports podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, Podbean or Pocket Casts.

• Subscribe to the Inside ND Sports channel on YouTube.

• Follow us on Twitter: @insideNDsports, @EHansenND and @TJamesND.

• Like us on Facebook: Inside ND Sports

• Follow us on Instagram: @insideNDsports