UF needs to ramp up the defense
DALLAS Florida coach Mike White has made no secret about what he thinks of the way the Gators played while getting eliminated by Arkansas in the quarterfinals of the SEC Tournament on Friday.
And he said if the No. 6 seed Gators play that way to open NCAA Tournament play Thursday against No. 11 seed St. Bonaventure, they can warm up the team’s charter flight early.
That is, if still in Dallas.
Last week after being sent packing early by the the plane is Razorbacks, the Gators had no plane to warm up. The airplane used for the UF charter flight to St. Louis for the SEC Tournament was commandeered by the U.S. military and sent to the Middle East.
With no vehicle for transporting the team, the band, the cheerleaders and the support staff, the UF contingent was stuck in St. Louis.
While the Gators were stuck in St. Louis, the players had to stay at a hotel and think about how poorly they played against Arkansas.
“I feel like it made it a little bit worse for us. We had to sit there. We had to watch all the games there in St. Louis. I feel like it made the sting like a little bit longer,” Florida junior guard Jalen Hudson said. “I don’t want to feel like that again, so I want to use that, know what I mean, to help push us forward. “It really stung.” White knows it will sting even more if the Gators have a repeat performance against St. Bonaventure and it all starts with defense.
“If we defend the way we did against Arkansas, we’ll be a one-and-done in this tournament,” White said.
UF has shown the ability to play tough defense at times this season, but getting consistent intensity out of this year’s group has been White’s biggest chore.
“You’ve got games where we look like a top 10 team and you’ve got games where we look like an NIT team,” White said.
Against St. Bonaventure, the Gators better not look like an NIT team. They’ll have be bring the pressure, extend the defense on the perimeter and make the Bonnies pay in the transition game.
“It’s transition defense, ball screen defense, isolation defense, our guards defending their guards at a high level,” White said. “Those things have to happen for us, or we might as well not show up.”