GAINESVILLE, Fla. – After ending the season on a three-game losing streak following a five-game win streak the Gators big-dance chances are in question again. Now Mike White’s squad will need a bigger performance in the SEC tournament.
As the eight-seed in Nashville, Florida will open up play Thursday at noon certain time against tenth-seeded Arkansas Razorbacks. Being a bubble team can be very stressful at this point in the season and it’s hard not to look ahead and think about the implications.
White is going to address the postseason with his team but the main focus is on the next game and taking it step by step.
“We’re going to address for a couple minutes today,” White said. “These guys are getting noise from a lot of other sources and people. And so I’m just gonna give a quick message today, and they can hear my noise.
“And that should be regardless of what this bracketologist says or this fan tells you, or your classmate, or your aunt or uncle, none of that matters because they're not on the selection committee. Let’s try to play really well against Arkansas. That’s it. That’s all we can focus on.”
Florida and Arkansas met earlier this year in Fayetteville. The Gators walked out with a 57-51 victory January 9. While Mason Jones finished with 30 points for the Razorbacks Florida was able to hold star big-man Daniel Gafford to only 9 points.
KeVaughn Allen led the way with 18 points to lead the Gators to the victory. This time around though is expected to be different.
“We have to do a better job on Gafford and Mason Jones, especially, but I say Gafford because he has to the be the focal point of everything offensively and defensively,” White said. “He’s playing better than he was at that point in the season.
“He’s one of the best players in the league, one of the best bigs in the entire country. Mason Jones had 30 on us. We did a decent job, if you look at the stat sheet, on Isaiah Joe, but he had some open looks. We can’t allow that again.
“He’s one of those guys that if he gets five or six open looks he’s going to make four or five of ‘em. He’s an elite shooter and a very, very good player in our league. This is a team that knocked us out of it last year. They’re very good. They’re playing as well as they have all year, coming off three [wins] in a row, and we’ve got to play really well.”
This entire season has been up and down for White and his players. It’s never good to go into your conference tourney after losing three in a row, but the Gators have a new opportunity now in the tournament.
“If we were sitting here having won four or five in a row, we’d be talking about riding this momentum,” White said. “It’s easier to talk about the clean slate when you’ve lost three in a row — and that’s what we’re talking about. New opportunities in front of us, opportunity Thursday, early afternoon.”
