Following last Saturday’s overtime win against Georgia, Florida Gators basketball coach Mike White said his team was playing with fire, and after playing with fire several games in a row, the Florida Gators finally got burned at South Carolina on Wednesday night.
It was an ugly offensive game from the start for both sides. Nearly six minutes and 18 combined turnovers into the game, the first points were finally scored by Kasey Hill to give Florida the lead. The Gators and Gamecocks let off the defensive gas enough four a few more points to be scored to close out the half, and Florida took a 28-21 lead into the locker room.
Nearly every game, the Gators have a stretch where they just seem to go into a hole. Unfortunately for Florida, that stretch lasted for what seemed like the entirety of the second half. South Carolina went on a 14-2 run early in the second half, as the Gators went ice cold on offense. Florida was 1-for-16 from the field 15 minutes into the second half, but was somehow still only down by three points.
The Gators brought the score back within one point four different times in the final minutes of the game, but with a whistle that never seemed to stop blowing, South Carolina had an answer at the line when it mattered, while Florida did not.
PJ Dozier pushed the lead to 56-53 for the Gamecocks with 22.6 seconds remaining. The Gators turned the ball over out of bounds on a pass from Chris Chiozza to Canyon Barry on the other end, and the game was sealed from there. Sindarius Thornwell, who led the Gamecocks with 20 points, finished it off with a made free throw to push it to a two-possession game with 16.5 seconds to go. South Carolina took the 57-53 conference win to remain unbeaten in SEC play, while Florida fell to 5-1 in conference play and dropped a seven-game winning streak.
The Gators were never able to find an offensive rhythm in the game against a South Carolina defense that ranks among the best in the country. Florida finished 19-for-54 from the field, 0-for-17 from three-point range, and 15-for-28 from the foul line. Canyon Barry led the Gators once again with 13 points, while Kasey Hill had 11.
“At times we’ve been pretty good offensively, and tonight was the opposite,” said White. “To come in here and win a game of this magnitude in an environment like this, we’ve gotta do better offensively.”
Before Wednesday, the Gators seemed to be turning the corner offensively. This type of game might have been on the horizon anyways, but likely no one imagined it would be this bad. The 0-for-17 mark from three ended a streak of 850 consecutive games with a made three-pointer for Florida that dated back to January of 1992.
“It’s discouraging,” White said. “On the one night you come in here and you have a chance and it would’ve been a really big win for us. I’m very surprised that we shot it the way that we shot it. Not that we shot it poorly, because South Carolina makes you shoot it poorly, but if we could’ve just had one of those, maybe the game would’ve been different.”
While it was a rough night for Florida’s offense, the defense played as well as it has in weeks. Getting back to playing good defense was a focal point going into the game, and the Gators accomplished that, holding the Gamecocks to 29 percent (15-for-51) from the field and forcing 15 turnovers with nine steals. White was able to take some positives from that.
“To be dead honest with you, I’ve been more unhappy in a couple of wins this year,” he said. “I thought we played really hard, competed a high level. This team, South Carolina, plays as hard as any team in college basketball. Hats off to them. No surprise with the intensity level they played with. I thought we played with a really high intensity level as well.”
The Gators head back to Gainesville with a lot to work on before Vanderbilt comes to town on Saturday. Vanderbilt beat Florida in both games played between the two teams last season, and the Gators will look for redemption in front of the fourth sellout crowd in five home games this year. While an undefeated SEC record is no longer in play for Florida, the perfect home record is still alive.