Appleby's buzzer-beater keeps Gators unbeaten

“The defense never rests.” – F. Lee Bailey For much of Wednesday night in Fort Myers, the 23rd-ranked Florida Gators endured one of those games when they couldn’t have thrown the basketball into the ocean from the end of the pier. What saved the Gators from absorbing their first loss of the season was the grown men on the team took it upon themselves to play tough, physical defense for 40 minutes.

In the end, everyone will remember the buzzer-beater three-pointer that Tyree Appleby nailed from 30 feet out that gave the Gators (5-0) their 71-68 win over the Ohio State Buckeyes (4-2), but a game-winning shot wouldn’t have been possible without mortal combat defense that resulted in 13 steals, 18 points off 18 turnovers and just seven second chance points.

“Our team prides ourselves on defense,” Appleby said after this rock fight that ended in a UF win. “That’s what we do. I think physicality is what we want and if a team wants to bring that physicality back, that’s fine. I know we’ve got a tough, gritty team. Our team is together always. I don’t think anybody in the country is going to be as tough as we are night in and night out.”

The toughness that carried the Gators to wins over Florida State’s grinders and to a win over California Monday night, was necessary from the opening whistle Wednesday night. Ohio State doesn’t have tremendous overall height, but the Buckeyes are a power team that is accustomed to outmuscling opponents. They tried to get physical against the Gators but instead of a finesse team that takes it and wilts, the Gators gave it right back.

That’s quite a change from recent years. Last year, in particular, the Gators probably would have backed off.

“We knew coming into the season everybody had low expectations of us,” Appleby said. “So, we doing really listen to the outside noise. Whatever stays between our team stays between our team. We know who we are. We know our identity and we know what we need to do to win every game.”

It wasn’t a total wasteland offensively, but the Gators had trouble stringing together runs of points, particularly in the first half, but also in the second when they fell behind by as many as 10. Ohio State led, 47-37, with 13:06 to go but that’s when UF dug deep and found the extra toughness they needed to come back.

“Going down by 10 late in the second half, we knew we just had to come together defensively and offensively, but mostly defensively because that’s what we pride ourselves on, the defensive end,” Appleby said. I think we picked up on the defensive end and then every huddle we knew … our coaches and the players on the bench, they kept saying we were going to win the game.”

The rally got started on the defensive end when Myreon Jones got a steal. Down on the offensive end, C.J. Felder scored a layup off a Castleton pass and was fouled. His three-point play with 12:36 did more than just cut the Ohio State lead down to seven. It breathed life back into the Gators.

Less than a minute later when Castleton scored on a stickback (11:16), the Gators closed within two (47-45), turning a very physical game into a backyard brawl the rest of the way. It wasn’t easy for UF because the Buckeyes kept building their lead back, twice to six points.

But each time Ohio State got a little bit of momentum, the Gators worked their way back into the game. That’s the makeup of this team according to Fleming. The combination of the intensity on the defensive end and a relentless attack mentality on the offensive end that kept getting the Gators to the free throw line helped to compensate for when shots weren’t falling, allowing the Gators to stay in the game.

“I kept telling Colin this is how we’re going to get back in the game – we gotta hit free throws, we gotta hit free throws!” Fleming said. “… I think that comes with older guys on the team being on the floor. We tried to attack them a lot because they were in foul trouble. That helped us a lot on the free throw line. We missed a lot but we made them when we needed them.”

The game seemed Ohio State’s to win until the final 36 seconds when UF got an alley-oop dunk from Appleby to Anthony Duruji that tied the game at 68-68 and that was followed by Myreon Jones outhustling the Buckeyes for a long rebound along the sideline with four seconds to go. He pivoted, found Appleby up ahead and a couple of dribbles later, the game-winning shot was on the way.

UF coach Mike White thought about calling a time out when Jones got the rebound, but instead let the game play out.

“We found a way to get a stop, long rebound and the rest is a blur it happened so quick,” White said. “Myreon Jones comes up with a loose ball, a long rebound whatever it was, advanced to Tyree. Then the question is do you use one [time out], do you use one? I would have liked to have gotten the ball closer but that’s all Tyree needed. He found space and made a huge play.”

The shot will be talked about a long time by Florida fans, but it would not have happened if this team hadn’t played with such intensity and physicality on the defensive end. Without a doubt, this is the best defensive team that White has had since he took over at Florida in 2015. It is the best Florida defensive team since the Gators made the Final Four in 2014.

“I’m proud of this group,” White said. “This is something to build on. We beat one of the better programs in the country and you’ve got a lot of stuff that you can improve on. I’m really proud of Tyree and the way he finished of course, but really, throughout the game we had a lot of adversity and we found a way.”

The Gators only shot 36.7 percent from the field (22-60) overall and 28.6 percent on three-pointers (4-14), so the offense was spotty at best. What the Gators did, however, was stifle Ohio State by forcing those 18 turnovers.

Fleming knows that when the Florida offense catches up to the defensive intensity, the Gators will be ready to take things to a whole new level.

“We can be so much better,” said the Charleston Southern transfer who was a two-time Defensive Player of the Year in the Big South Conference. “We missed a lot of free throws and we didn’t run our offense a lot to our capabilities in the first half. That’s the bright spot about it because we know we can be a lot better. Luckily, we scapped this one out and got the win.”

As long as the Gators make it a point that the defense never rests, they’ll have chances to scrap out a lot of games and get the win.

The Gators are idle until Sunday afternoon when they face Troy (4-2) of the Sun Belt Conference at the O-Dome.