Florida Gators women’s basketball wins 9th straight

Special on the Florida Gators women’s basketball team

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – The University of Florida women’s basketball team won its ninth consecutive game on Sunday (Dec. 13), and the result was never in doubt. The Gators led from start to finish, stifling Robert Morris with their high-pressure defense in a wire-to-wire 79-52 victory at the Stephen C. O’Connell Center.

For the fifth time this season, Florida forced its opponent to commit at least 24 turnovers. The defense also flustered Robert Morris’ shooters, as UF held the Colonials to 17-of-47 shooting (36.2 percent), marking the fifth time this year its opponent shot below 37 percent.

Three Gators—Dyandria Anderson, Eleanna Christinaki, Haley Lorenzen—scored at least 12 points.

Christinaki led the trio with a team-high 13 points, her third consecutive 13-plus-point outing. Lorenzen snared a team-best eight rebounds, while Anderson dished out a game-high five assists.

How It Happened

Florida’s defense was the prevailing theme of the day, and it created the team’s lead through the first quarter.

The Gators forced six turnovers in the final four-plus minutes of the opening frame, building a five-point edge (14-9) by the end of the quarter. Although Robert Morris turned in an efficient second quarter, the Gators made seven of their nine attempts, including a perfect 3-of-3 shooting mark from distance. Consecutive threes by Carlie Needles and Cassie Peoples in the final minute of the stanza stretched the UF lead to 11 points (36-25) as the intermission.

A pair of triples by Dyandria Anderson provided the Gators with all the momentum they needed to close out the victory.

The first came at the 8:20 mark of the third quarter, which gave Florida a 15-point advantage (40-25). Anderson’s next trifecta forced Robert Morris to burn a timeout in an unsuccessful attempt to halt a 9-0 spurt that became a quarter-ending 17-5 run.

The Gators would lead by as many as 31 points before the final buzzer sounded.

Florida vs. Robert Morris: Series History

• The Gators improve their all-time record against Robert Morris to 3-0
• This was Florida’s largest margin of victory in the series, topping its 20-point victory (70-5) from the Dec. 21, 2010 meeting

Gator Starters

• Dyandria Anderson, Eleanna Christinaki, Haley Lorenzen, Carlie Needles, Ronni Williams

o    Tonight marked the eighth consecutive game for this starting lineup

News and Numbers of Note

• The nine consecutive victories is tied for the fourth longest in program history.
• This is UF’s first nine-game win streak since the 2013-14 club (Nov. 30-Jan. 9) posted a 15-game run for the program’s longest winning streak
• The Gators have won nine of their first 10 games for the only the eighth time in program history and the first time since starting the 2008-09 campaign with a 15-1 record
• Florida has scored at least 70 points in all 10 of its games this season—it had eight such outings in the entire 2014-15 campaign
• Florida forced Robert Morris to commit a season-high 24 turnovers
• The Gators collected 15 offensive rebounds for the eighth time this season
• Florida converted 19 free throws, marking the fifth time in the last seven games it sank 19-plus freebies

Quotes from the Court

Florida Head Coach Amanda Butler

Opening Statement…

“I was really pleased. That was a really solid team and they do a lot of good things and put us in some challenging positions. And they did. More than anything, I really liked the way our team made adjustments in the second half after we talked about them at halftime. We were trying to be the more aggressive team.”

On the adjustments in the locker room at halftime…

“One of the things that is great about this team and one of the reasons I love coaching them is I come into our locker room and of course we have our coaches’ meeting before we even get into the locker room and they have a players only meeting where they talk about what they want to see in the second half. It is rare that there are any differences between the two meetings. That was absolutely the case. They knew that they had to do a better job as rebounders and they did. They crashed the boards on the offensive end and did a better job of boxing out and grabbing the ball on the defensive end. That really makes us look more in-sync.”

On starting the season 9-1…

“No, I am surprised at all. I have the benefit of the summer, the summer workouts, the preseason and all the practices. I think this team from the beginning has had a very strong sense of who they were and who they could become. They committed to one another first and committed to our purpose much more than an individual purpose. That is a reflection of our culture and something that is committed to daily. So, no real surprise I don’t think from any of us. It is a privilege of being in our locker room.”

Florida sophomore forward Haley Lorenzen

On not settling for an early lead…
“We knew coming in that Robert Morris is a team full of fight and always has a chance to come back. You know once we are up we want to stay up, we want to keep expanding that lead even more.”

On whether or not she tweaked her ankle during the game…

“I tweaked my ankle a little bit, but nothing major. It is good we have a couple days off so I can get it back to normal. But I was grabbing a defensive rebound and I just happened to land on someone’s foot. It was kind of one of those things you can’t avoid.”

Robert Morris Head Coach Sal Buscaglia

On the game against UF…

“Although we fell short, I believe we gave a great deal of effort and I think it will prove to be very beneficial in our future games. These are all experiences that I want my players to be a part of. We still have a lot of work to do, but, as I said before, I think it’s going to be a really exciting season for us as we finish non-conference play and head into our (conference) schedule.” 

Up Next for the Gators

• Florida will host the Gator Holiday Classic on Dec. 20-21 at the Stephen C. O’Connell Center in Gainesville, Fla. N.C. State and Eastern Kentucky will tip off the event at 12 p.m., while the Gators will face Saint Francis at 2:30 p.m. in Sunday’s second game.

The second day of the event features games at 12 p.m. and 2:30 p.m. on Monday.