The Florida Gators got a number one seed in their eight-team bracket for the National Invitational Tournament Sunday night. The Gators (23-10) will open the tournament Wednesday (7 p.m., Stephen C. O’Connell Center) with Jacksonville University (18-13), which won the regular season championship of the Atlantic Sun Conference.
“We’re grateful for the opportunity to continue our season at the NIT,” said Florida coach Billy Donovan in a statement released Sunday evening. “We’re looking forward to the opportunity to continue to practice and grow as a team. Jacksonville will be an extremely tough opponent. They won their league and played a very strong non-conference schedule, so we’ll be playing a very formidable opponent on Wednesday.”
If the Gators advance past the first round, they will face the winner of Wednesday night’s Miami (18-12)-Providence (19-13) game in round two. By virtue of their number one seed, the Gators will have a chance to play three home games at the O-Dome, where they were 16-1 this season.
Florida has lost four of its last six games. At the Southeastern Conference Tournament in Tampa, Florida won its first round game with Arkansas then lost 61-58 to Auburn in round two. That finish puts the Gators into a similar situation as last year when they lost their final three regular season games and their first round game in the SEC Tournament, landing the Gators in the NIT and breaking a string of nine straight NCAA appearances.
In last year’s NIT, the Gators won home games with San Diego State and Creighton before going on the road to Tempe where they beat Arizona State. That earned a trip to New York for the semifinals where the Gators saw their season come to an end at the hands of UMass.
The Gators are led in scoring by sophomore guard Nick Calathes (17.2 points, 5.4 rebounds and 6.4 assists per game), sophomore center Alex Tyus (12.4 points, 6.0 rebounds), who is coming off a 21-point, 11-rebound effort in the loss to Auburn, and freshman Erving Walker, who averages 10.0 points per game. Walker has scored in double figures in eight of the last 11 games.
Jacksonville started the season 0-5 but those five losses included a two-pointer in Tallahassee to Florida State, a nine-point loss on the road at Georgetown, an eight-point loss on the road at Baylor and a three-point loss in Atlanta to Georgia Tech. The Dolphins also lost by 13 in Columbus to Ohio State later in the season.
At one point JU was 3-8, but the Dolphins won 15 of their final 21 games and had a nine-game winning streak at one point in the season. Jacksonville made it to the championship game of the Atlantic Sun Conference Tournament only to lose to East Tennessee State.
The Dolphins are led in scoring by 5-10 guard Ben Smith, who averaged 17.2 points, 4.0 assists and 2.2 steals per game. Smith is a 37.8 percent shooter from the three-point line. He lit up Georgia Tech for 30 points and scored 29 in the loss to East Tennessee in the A-Sun title game.
Jacksonville’s front line isn’t tall (6-7 center Marcus Allen is the tallest starter) but very quick. Allen averages 10 points and 6.8 rebounds per game. He had six games in double figures in rebounding with a high game of 15 against Campbell. Lehmon Colbert (6-6) averages 11.8 points and 6-2 rebounds per game. His best games were 28 points against Stetson and 13 rebounds against East Tennessee. Colbert shoots 42.5 percent from the three-point stripe. The small forward is 6-5 Ayron Hardy, a 44 percent three-point shooter who averages 10.2 points, 5.4 rebounds per game and 1.7 steals per game.
Rounding out the starting lineup is 6-2 shooting guard Travis Conn, who averages 6.9 points per game. He hits 37.3 percent from the three-point line.
The Dolphins’ only size is 6-10 sophomore Syzmon Lukasiak, a Polish import who scores 2.9 points per game off the bench.
The Dolphins averaged 74. 2 points per game this year, shooting 44.9 percent from the floor and 35.4 percent on three-pointers.