The Florida Gators basketball team (17-11, 8-7 SEC) fell to the Vanderbilt Commodores (17-11, 9-6 SEC) at home in Gainesville, Florida on Tuesday night with a final score of 87-74.
Vanderbilt took off on an early 6-0 run with Florida giving up three turnovers in the first three minutes. John Egbunu is the force that brought the Gators into the game with back-to-back baskets to put them on the board.
Florida was trailing by five points at 9-4 when Kasey Hill took a note from Egbunu and made two in a row, bringing the Gators just two points shy of tying up the game. However, the Commodores were not ready to give up their lead that easily and extended their lead to 22-12 ending with a layup by Jeff Roberson with 10:17 left in the half.
Vandy was able to hold on to their lead until an Egbunu slam and a three-point play from Devin Robinson cut it down to five points at 27-22 with 5:11 to play before halftime. The remainder of the half consisted of the Gators battling to get a close game before heading into the locker room, and they managed.
Four free throws were made by KeVaughn Allen, Egbunu and Hill to bring the Gators down by just two points with less than a minute on the clock. Schuyler Rimmer had a good look to slam in a dunk, but Matthew Fisher-Davis swatted it. Vandy’s Josh Henderson got the ball and chucked it from about 85 feet away to make a buzzer beater, top-10 basket.
This put the Commodores back up to a five-point lead at 40-35 and a boatload of confidence as they headed into the locker rooms for halftime.
Coming back from the half, the confidence from the final second of the first half did not dissipate for Vanderbilt. Just three minutes in the Commodores scored 10 points and had a nine-point lead at 50-41. Vandy managed to get to a 10-point high lead on two occasions, with a jumper from Chris Chiozza separating the two. After the ‘Dores reached their second double-digit lead, the Gators were fed up.
Justin Leon and Chris Chiozza made four points in less than a minute with two free throws and a layup each to bring them within five points of tying the game with 12:49 to play. The Gators were able to get the Commodores’ lead down to two on two separate occasions, the second time being after a layup from Brandone-Francis Ramirez with 6:38 left in the game.
Yet, once again Vandy was able to pull away and extended the once close game to an eleven-point lead with just 2 minutes left. Egbunu finally bought the Gators a basket and did a traditional Egbunu slam to put them back within single-digits of tying the game with 2:24 on the clock.
That is, until a foul on Dorian Finney-Smith sent Roberson to the foul line who made two of two to put Vanderbilt back up by 11 at 80-69 with 1:45 to go. The Gators fought hard to bring themselves within a chance of winning the ball game, but just could not pull it off.
The final score of 87-74 left the Florida Gators men’s basketball team with a loss by 13 points at home to the Vanderbilt Commodores.