Gators lose 77-70
NCAA run ends with loss to S. Carolina in Elite Eight.
NEWYORK— It’s over. The jolting sound of duct tape being ripped off the locker name tags set the scene. It was the only sound to be heard in a silent, dejected Florida Gators locker room Sunday night.
Florida’s fairy-tale ride through the NCAA Tournament ended and it didn’t feel good. What made it worse was that it came at the hands of a South Carolina team the Gators knew they could defeat, just not on this night.
The No. 4 seed Gators (27-9) bumbled their way through a rough second half and watched No. 7 seed South Carolina (26-10) pull away with a 77-70 victory in the East Region final in front an announced sellout crowd of 20,047 at Madison Square Garden.
The Gamecocks reached the first Final Four in school history and earned a date with West Region winner Gonzaga. No. 3 seed Oregon and No. 1 seed North Carolina are the other two teams headed to Glendale, Ariz., to play for a national title.
“Obviously, very, very heartbreaking,” Florida coach Mike White said after the loss. “To make it this far, you’re right there with a chance to go to the Final Four. You’re up seven at halftime, doing some good things and really we weren't playing our best basketball in the first half.”
Maybe not the best, but it was pretty darned good for the majority of the opening half. UF, however, couldn’t sustain it.
The Gators, who went into halftime riding a wave of momentum thanks to a 3-point shooting barrage that gave
thema 40-33 halftime lead, left the offensive energy in the locker room for the final 20 minutes.
“Weknewwe couldn’t relax just because we were up seven at halftime,” said UF guard Chris Chiozza, whose Friday night heroics propelled the Gators into Sunday’s East title game. “South Carolina came out and played a good second half, we had a couple of turnovers we shouldn’t have had and they were able to convert and then make enough free throws to close the game out.”
White said the halftime conversation was more focused on the things the Gators needed to shore up from the first half, including the 11 turnovers the Gators had at the break.
“We talked not about holding onto a lead, not about next 20 minutes,” White said. “We talked about staying in the moment, being right here, right now and the first defensive possession of the second half, let’s address that. And then let’s move on to the second defensive possession.
“Obviously, those weren’t the right words, becausewe didn’t get off to a very good defensive start in the secondhalf.”
It didn’t start well offensively, either. Florida missed all 14 of its second-half 3-point attempts and was a frigid 11 of 35 (31 percent) from the field in the final 20 minutes.
South Carolina, meanwhile, took control behind a second-half surge from SEC Player of the Year Sindarius Thornwell.
Thornwell scored eight consecutive points in a second-half span of two minutes that turned a 57-55 UF lead into a 61-59 South Carolina advantage with 4:54 left. Thornwell, the East Regional’s most valuable player, scored 26 points and carried the Gamecocks through a rough second-half stretch for both teams.
The Gators went nearly six minutes in the middle of the half without a field goal and were 0 for 9 from3-point range in the first 12 minutes of the final period, but South Carolina still couldn’t put the Gators away.
Florida players — and even White— could not explain the difference in the Gators marksmanship from one half to the next.
“I don’t know,” said Justin Leon, the senior forward who led UF with18 points, 14 of which came in the first half. “I feel like we got the same shots. We just [weren’t] making them.”
Senior point guard Kasey Hill agreed.
“No, we got wide open shots. They just didn't fall in for us at the time,” he said. “We kept attacking, trying to bend the screens and throw it back and the shots just [weren’t] going in.”
As White pointed out, however, that Florida had not been a team that relied on its offense, but a team that had let its defense create opportunities on the other end and he was a bit disappointed in that aspect of his squad’s performance.
“We had some poor transition defense. … We had some lack of communication, yet we're up seven [at halftime,]” White said. “And for whatever reason, in the second half, we couldn't match that same defensive intensity, again, which wasn't an A, but itwas pretty good, it was probably a B for us. I thought South Carolina made all the plays that they needed to.”
KeVaughn Allen’s floating prayer as the shot clock expired that banked high off the glass and in, gave UF a 55-53 lead with 7:17 left and it looked like it might be just the jolt UF needed, but the Gators could not sustain any positive energy.
Meanwhile, a partisan South Carolina crowd kept the Gamecocks charged up. Florida could manage just three field goals in the final four minutes and the Gators watched South Carolina seal the win with a parade to converted free throws.
“Theywere just the better team, honestly. That's all it was,” Hill said.
UF’s season ends at 27-9 and its ride to the NCAA East Region title game was a big surprise to many college basketball observers, but not a determined team of Gators who still figure they belong at the Final Four in Arizona.
“It’s unfortunate somebody had to lose; unfortunate these Gators are going home,” White said. “They’ve had an amazing year and the young guys will learn from it and these seniors will be successful in life. And I’m proud to have coached them.”