TAMPA — Maybe the St. Pete Times Forum wasn’t packed to the rafters but if you closed your eyes it really sounded like there was someone in every seat screaming his lungs out. For a pre-Christmas game whose outcome will count more in the RPI than anything else, Thursday night’s Big East Challenge matchup of #10 Florida and #6 Syracuse had a March feel to it.
This was an NCAA Tournament atmosphere and Syracuse played like a team that is going to be around when March turns to April and the NCAA championship is decided.
“I think just based on what I’ve seen of Syracuse they’re capable of winning a national championship,” Florida coach Billy Donovan said after the Gators dropped a hard fought, 85-73 decision to the Orange. “I think Bobby Knight made a comment last night that he thought they [Syracuse] were the best team in the country. I haven’t seen everybody play so I probably can’t comment on that but I would be hard pressed to see if there are three or four teams better than them.”
Maybe there aren’t 3-4 teams better than Syracuse but the Gators walked away from this game feeling they’re one of the teams capable of knocking off the Orange if they just do a better job of taking care of the basketball, playing better transition defense and boxing out on the offensive boards.
The Gators turned the ball over 19 times and they were outrebounded 43-31. Syracuse scored 18 fast break points to only four for the Gators. Additionally, the Gators were only 7-13 from the foul line while Syracuse had a whopping 31 attempts (made 18).
It was enough to make Chandler Parsons shake his head in disappointment. He left the floor feeling the Gators were more than capable of hanging with and knocking off Syracuse.
“The things we were bad at tonight are the things we can control like rebounds, transition defense and free throws,” Parsons said after turning gin a 19-point, five assist, four rebound night. “We just need to do a better job in those three things.”
Syracuse shot 32-61 from the field but only 3-13 from the three-point line. Where the Orange wore the Gators out was in the paint (50-30 advantage for Syracuse) and on second chance points (Syracuse won that battle, 17-4).
Florida’s problems getting stops were most evident in the first half when Syracuse built up a 10-point lead (32-22) mostly on the strength of going inside to Jackson, who scored 16 first half points, 12 of them on stickbacks off his seven offensive rebounds.
Syracuse had 16 offensive rebounds on the night, 12 of them in the first half. Although the Gators adjusted in the second half and did a better job on the boards, that ability to score in the paint in the first half proved to be the killer for Florida.
“We got stops,” point guard Erving Walker said. “We stopped them and we let them get offensive rebounds and putbacks and we didn’t get back fast enough in transition. I give them credit, but that’s more on us.”
It wasn’t for lack of a good game plan. The Gators had the right game plan — make the entry pass to the key and attack the zone from the inside out — but there was a problem with execution. Parsons and Dan Werner were charged with a combined 10 turnovers but most of the miscues were passes that slid off the fingers of Florida players who got open down low.
Defensively, the game plan was to stop Syracuse from the three-point line — the Orange came into the game shooting 42 percent on the season — and the plan would have worked if only the Gators could have done a better job at keeping the ball out of the paint.
“We had a great scouting report but I think nothing coach told us to do we did,” Kenny Boynton said. “Defensively we weren’t talking or anything. They got what they wanted.”
Yet, the Gators stayed with Syracuse almost basket for basket and with 10:06 remaining in the game, they had a 59-57 lead thanks to back-to-back threes by Boynton, who finished the night with 20 points, and Walker, who chipped in with 14.
That’s exactly when the Gators needed a stop and they got a great defensive effort by Boynton on Andy Rautins, forcing a wild looking shot from beyond the arc, but the ball still went in, putting Syracuse in front for good, 60-59.
“I think a big momentum shift in the game was when we went up by two when Walker and Boynton made back to back threes but give Rautins credit because I thought we defended him about as well as you can defend a guy and he made a very, very hard shot. We came down and missed a three and they came back and Johnson made a three.”
The Gators went from a two-point lead to a four-point deficit in a little more than a minute and they never recovered. Two missed threes and two missed free throws gave Syracuse all it needed to expand the lead and take control of the game.
It was the perfect opportunity for the Gators to fold and give up, but even though Syracuse pulled away to win the game by 12 points, there was no give up in these Gators and if there was one thing to take away from this game, it is that Billy Donovan has a team that will battle and fight to the end.
Even though the Gators were outmuscled inside by Rick Jackson (19 points and 11 rebounds), Arinze Onuaku (18 points, five rebounds), Wes Johnson (19 points and 11 rebounds) and Kris Joseph (12 points and 10 rebounds), the Gators never quit battling.
“I’m not into moral victories and I don’t think they are,” Donovan said. “I think tonight we lost to a team that performed and played better than we did and we lost to a very good basketball team. This is a team that beat Carolina by 16 or 18 and they beat California by 25. We had an opportunity to take the lead there and that’s what good teams do. When their backs are to the wall they step up and make some really good plays.
“I’ve enjoyed this tam and I enjoy coaching them. I think there is a passion and a fire in them to get better and improve on the things that we need to improve on.”
It was Florida’s first loss of the season and the last game the Gators will play until December 19 when they face Richmond in the Orange Bowl Classic in Sunrise. Exams will take up the next five days but it’s a time to reflect and practice on all those things the Gators know must improve.
“We can play with these guys,” Walker said. “We can beat these guys. I mean, Syracuse is a great team, but we can beat them. We have to do a better job of doing the things we do. We gave up too much tonight. We can’t let that happen again.”
A year ago, the Gators would have walked away from this game happy just to have stayed close. This year, they walked away feeling like they not only belong, but should be winning big time games played in a big time atmosphere.