Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Chiozza scores 16, leads Gators over Cardinals
GAINESVILLE — Chris Chiozza scored 16 points, Jalen Hudson added 13 and Florida beat Incarnate Word 75-60 on Friday night.
Egor Koulechov chipped in 12 points for the Gators, who won for the third time in four games.
Florida (8-4) made six 3-pointers and converted two 3-point plays in the first 11 minutes of the second half to turn a close game into a lopsided affair. The Gators pulled away with a 17-2 run over a four-minute stretch.
Chiozza scored eight of those 17 points. He made a driving shot in the lane with two defenders draped all over him. He hit a 3-pointer and then converted a 3-point play off a steal.
Florida shot 39 percent from the field, including 9 of 36 from 3-point range. It wasn’t a stellar night, but it was the first time in a month coach Mike White’s team scored that many points.
The Gators’ more pressing problem has been defense, and nothing they did against Incarnate Word (5-5) eased White’s concerns. After all, the Cardinals entered the game ranked No. 297 in college basketball’s Ratings Percentage Index.
Charles Brown III led Incarnate Word with 13 points. Simi Socks added 11.
Florida closed out nonconference play by winning three of its final four. that’s eluded them year after year.
Oakland is 0-16 against Michigan State after an 86-73 loss to the secondranked Spartans last weekend, and after the game, Kampe was blunt in saying how upset he was that his team couldn’t pull off the upset. Oakland has built a solid mid-major program that can compete with bigname schools, but without a signature accomplishment — like an NCAA Tournament run or a win over a team like Michigan State — it’s hard to get noticed.
“It’s time for this program to win that game,” Kampe said. “We win them, but we beat Clemson and we beat Georgia and we beat teams like that, and nobody cares. This is a game that people would have cared.”
Here are a few other under-the-radar teams that have had brief chances to shine on a bigger stage this season — and what they’ve done with those opportunities.
Buffalo at Syracuse remaining, but Syracuse came away with an 81-74 win. Davidson at UNC Davidson hasn’t won an NCAA Tournament game since Stephen Curry’s run in 2008, and although the Wildcats have moved up to the Atlantic 10 since then, they can always use more signature wins. They took on North Carolina in Charlotte on Dec. 1 and lost 85-75. Luke Maye — who grew up about a 10-minute drive from Davidson — had 24 points and 17 rebounds for the Tar Heels.
Indiana State at Indiana
With the Hoosiers struggling under new coach Archie Miller, in-state rivals are getting their licks in. Indiana State routed Indiana 90-69, snapping the Hoosiers’ streak of 32 straight wins in home openers. Earlier this week, Fort Wayne beat Indiana for a second straight season. Lipscomb at Tennessee Lipscomb was one of the top teams in the Atlantic Sun last season, but the Bisons have never made the NCAA Tournament and remain in relative anonymity, even compared to some of their mid-major brethren. One way to start changing that would have been to knock off a nationally ranked Tennessee team earlier this month, but the Volunteers prevailed 81-71 .