Crunch Time Win! Florida Gators Take Down Mississippi State

With 1:32 remaining in the game and the Florida Gators reeling under pressure that had reduced a once-formidable 17-point lead to just six, Mississippi State got what the analytics will tell you is a gift. To break State’s full court pressure, the Gators got the ball past the midcourt line into the hands of 6-11 freshman Alex Condon, who came into the game shooting less than 66.7 percent from the foul line.

Photo Credit FloridaGators.com

The percentages say an inexperienced kid like Condon wilts under the pressure and does an oh-fer or, at best, 1-2 from the line. This time the analytics were wrong. Condon, who had yet to score, looked like he lives on the foul line. He didn’t miss either shot, expanding Florida’s lead to 71-63 and turning this into a 3-possession game. Condon’s two critical free throws had a calming effect on the Gators, who nailed eight of nine shots from the foul line to close out a 79-70 win that evened Florida’s Southeastern Conference record at 3-3.

While a blowout win would have pleased the 8,484 at the O-Dome, the way the game ended with the Gators knocking down one free throw after another was just one more sign Florida is turning the corner. In the final 7:22 the Gators hit only one shot from the field – a 3-pointer by Will Richard with 4:11 left – but they were 10-11 from the foul line, finishing the night 17-20. In a league as tough as the Southeastern Conference, the good teams come through in the clutch at the foul line.

This win was more than just exceptional free throw shooting, though. The Gators protected the basketball, turning the ball over only seven times. Down at the defensive end, they were in the face of the Bulldogs all night long. Mississippi State launched plenty of shots but shot only 38.7 percent (29-75) from the field overall and a miserable 24.2 percent (8-33) from the 3-point line. Added together, it enabled the Gators to earn a second straight SEC win and a bit of momentum heading into Saturday’s high noon showdown at the O-Dome with Georgia (14-5, 4-2 SEC).

“We had a 17-point lead with about eight minutes to go, and, listen, they’re a really good team,” Florida coach Todd Golden said. “There’s going to be some runs. You know, they hadn’t shot it well most of the night and then I think they hit two or three threes on, you know, three or four possessions … We got caught in a little bit of an area where you want to break the press, you want to stay aggressive, but at the same time, you’ve got a big lead, you don’t want to be too aggressive. And I think to their credit, they played with no fear of failure, you know, the final eight minutes of the game and we tightened up a little bit. On me, I need to make sure my guys understand I want them to be aggressive and attack in those moments. But, with that being said, you know, six points with the ball, Condo makes his, like you guys said, eight to 10 free throws down the stretch to ice it, and never allowed them to get super, super tight in the final four minutes.”

Mississippi State’s run that cut the lead from 17 to six wasn’t so much the Gators getting complacent as much as it was getting a bit too deliberate with the basketball. The Bulldogs were already in a full court press mode when Tyrese Samuel dunked to make it 66-49, but the press got more aggressive, into a full attack mode. Once the Gators crossed midcourt, the Bulldogs tried to double everything above the foul line.

Mississippi State’s pressure didn’t force the Gators into wild shots or silly turnovers, but in trying to protect the basketball, Florida lost the aggression that had the Bulldogs teetering on the verge of a 20-point or better loss. The Bulldogs parlayed the slowdown into an 11-0 run that only ended when Richard hit a 3-ball from the left wing with 4:11 left.

That it was Richard to the rescue was no surprise. Richard scored 18 points in the first half including a thunder dunk off a steal with 25 seconds to go that sealed a 43-34 Florida lead at the break. He finished the game with 23, hitting 4-7 from the 3-point line and 3-4 from the foul line to go with nine rebounds, one assist, two blocked shots and two steals.

“I think he had his best game as a Gator tonight, for sure ... 23 points, nine rebounds, four on the offensive glass, created some second-chance opportunities for us early in the game,” Golden said. “That led to some points and got us going a little bit, hit some big threes. He hit a huge three in that run, a little shot-fake, side-step, banged it. But, you know, to your point, 23 points, nine rebounds on the glass, two steals, two blocks, plus-nine. He gave us a really, really great game tonight, and I think he’s continuing to get more comfortable getting into SEC play, and he’s been playing pretty well. I expect him to continue to do that.” 

The Gators were down 15-10 in the first half when Richard hit his first 3-pointer with 11:08 left. He was just starting to heat up and once he started feeling it, the Gators took command of the game. Florida was up 18-17 with 8:04 to go when Richard hit his second 3-ball. He stretched the lead to six (28-22) with a 3-pointer at the 5:52 mark. He finished the half by scoring Florida’s last four points on a layup and the dunk with 25 seconds to go.

There was no halftime lull for the Gators, either. In the first minute of the second half, they established that they had come to play with a 5-0 run straight out of the locker room. The lead hovered in the 12-14-point range until Walter Clayton Jr. hit a 3-pointer with 11:42 to go for Florida’s first 17-point lead of the game, 59-42.

In the first 12 minutes of the second half, the Gators moved the ball about as well as they have all year. The assist totals (10) don’t reflect how the Gators affected the MSU defensive effort with the ball movement. So much of the MSU defense is predicated on doubling the ball and forcing bad shots late in the 30-second clock. For the most part, that was ineffective against UF.

“The way they play, you know, they're hard to score against and they switch a little bit,” Golden said. “They do different things give to contain you and our big thing tonight on the offensive end as simple as it sounds, but it's a recurring theme of this team that we have this year, is just to get a shot. Let's make sure we get shots. I think we had eight turnovers at Missouri. I think it's seven tonight. That's a great recipe for success in this league. Just take care of the ball. ZP [Zyon Pullin], you know, that's who it starts with, played 34 minutes tonight, no turnovers and he’s handling the ball a ton. Walter only had two, Will had one, Riley [Kugel] had one so our perimeter did a really good job taking care of it. And, if we can keep that number at or below — 12 is really our goal — if we keep that number at around 10, we’re going to have a lot of success for this team.”

This was Florida’s second consecutive strong defensive effort and third in the last four games. The Gators rotated so well that the Bulldogs didn’t get a lot of wide open shots. Their leading scorer on the night, Josh Hubbard, finished with 26 points but he had to take 25 shots to get them including 17 from the 3-point line.

“We’re definitely more connected on the defensive end now then we were 2-3 weeks ago,” Golden said. “I didn’t do a good enough job early in the year on emphasizing that end. We really wanted to focus on getting out and playing fast and scoring a lot, which is fun but at the end of the day you’ve got to get stops to win games. We really made a concerted effort, really after the Mississippi game, where we weren’t nearly good enough on that end to improve; come back, beat Arkansas, play well on the defensive end at Tennessee, the result was not good but I thought our effort and our intent was a lot better on the defensive end, and I thought we had a really good effort at Missouri …”

Mississippi State big man Tolu Smith, the focal point of Florida’s defensive effort, was held to 10 points on 5-12 shooting and he turned the ball over four times. Where the Gators had success was bringing double teams from different places and angles every time the Bulldogs got the ball to him down on the blocks.

“Listen, he went 5-for-12, 10 points and four turnovers,” Golden said. “That’s about as well as anybody's guarded him all year, you know, and he got us early a little bit, but we doubled him and made him see bodies every time he had catches and, you know, we felt like if we didn't allow him to get as close to the rim as he wanted that it would run them off the line … I think everything you can do to get him away from the basket will make you more successful and the double bothered him. Bother him, force some turnovers, it just made him not as aggressive on his catches going to the rim.”

In addition to Richard’s 23 points, the Gators got 15 each from Pullin (5 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 blocked shot, no turnovers) and Clayton (6-6 from the foul line, five rebounds, 2 assists). Samuel had 12 points (8 rebounds, 2 assists).

Overall, the Gators hit 27-64 from the field (42.2 percent) and 32 percent (8-25) from the 3-point line.

Gators move up: Florida's win over Mississippi State moved the Gators up to No. 36 in the important Kenpom.com rankings, three spots ahead of Mississippi State. The Gators came into the game No. 46 in the NCAA Net Rankings, while Mississippi State was No. 40. Those rankings should change when the NCAA updates its rankings sometime today.

SEC basketball

Wednesday’s scores: FLORIDA (13-6, 3-3 SEC) 79, Mississippi State (13-6, 2-4 SEC) 70; Alabama (13-6, 5-1 SEC) 79, No. 8 Auburn (16-3, 5-1 SEC) 75; Ole Miss (16-3, 3-3 SEC) 77, Arkansas (10-9, 1-5 SEC) 51; Georgia (14-5, 4-2 SEC) 68, LSU (11-8, 3-3 SEC) 66

Saturday’s games: Georgia (14-5, 4-2 SEC) at FLORIDA (13-6, 3-3 SEC); No. 5 Tennessee (14-4, 4-1 SEC) at Vanderbilt (5-13, 0-5 SEC); No. 6 Kentucky (14-4, 4-2 SEC) at Arkansas (10-9, 1-5 SEC); No. 8 Auburn (16-3, 5-1 SEC) at Mississippi State (13-6, 2-4 SEC); LSU (11-8, 3-3 SEC) at Alabama (13-6, 5-1 SEC); Missouri (8-11, 0-6 SEC) at South Carolina (16-3, 4-2 SEC); Ole Miss (16-4, 3-3 SEC) at Texas A&M (12-7, 3-3 SEC)