From my column at Gatorbaitmedia.com
By Franz Beard
This was not one of those just like we drew it up on the blackboard wins for the Florida Gators Saturday afternoon at the O-Dome. There is absolutely no way you can game plan coming back to win a game when your team is within a couple of breaths away from going belly up in the water at halftime. There is also no way you can write a script that calls for a rally led by a 6-9, 172-pound freshman center who just might be the skinniest player in all of Division I basketball and a guy so forgotten that most of the folks at the O-Dome and watching on ESPN2 were unaware that he was even still on the team.
Imagine how surprised the Oklahoma State Cowboys were that the 13-point lead they held with 17:05 left in the game would dissipate because Tuongthach Gatkek and Niels Lane ignited spectacular reversal of fortune. The Cowboys had some video on the 6-9 Gatkek, who has seen his playing time increase substantially since injuries to Colin Castleton and Jason Jitoboh, but he never had anything like the kind of game he had Saturday. Lane hadn’t even sniffed the court since four minutes of mop-up time in Florida’s 87-62 blowout over Stony Brook just before Christmas. It’s hard to get more unknown than that.
But there they were, two unexpected heroes lighting a match that became a five-alarm fire the way the Gators (13-8) went from one foot in the grave to an 81-72 win over Oklahoma State in the SEC/Big 12 Challenge. Gatkek, who weighs more than 100 pounds less than the guy he replaced in the lineup (Jitoboh, who tips the scales at 285) scored a career high eight points. He was 4-6 from the foul line including a couple of critical free throws when the Cowboys were trying to trade fouls for possessions late in the game. In addition to his points, he had three rebounds, a steal and three blocked shots, the last one a spectacular two-handed roof of a rejection with 2:59 left in the game. He was quite the unexpected presence in the paint.
“We got our two bigs out right now but every day in practice he pushes and pushes and pushes us,” Phlandrous Fleming Jr. said. Fleming finished the game with 14 points, six rebounds, two assists and a steal. “He got his chance today and he made a great impact. I’m real happy for Tuong.”
Lane didn’t score a point, but his impact on the game can’t be measured at the offensive end. He did his damage on defense, playing 13 minutes after getting a surprise start at the outset of the second half. He was at the front of Florida’s 2-2-1 press that gave the Cowboys fits. After the Gators had erased the Oklahoma State deficit for a 58-56 lead, Lane came through with a spectacular block of a floater by Avery Anderson III with 7:40 left in the game that Tyree Appleby picked off and turned into a transition jumper at the other end. A little more than a minute later, Lane stuffed Anderson again. Then, with the Gators leading 65-61 with 4:26 to go Lane came up with a steal that led to Phlandrous Fleming Jr. nailing a three-pointer that extended the lead to seven. For his time on the court, the Gators were +14 points.
“I thought Niels Lane was fantastic,” White said. “He played thirteen minutes and was +14. You’re +14 and you take one shot in thirteen minutes, it’s a good example for all young people and even his teammates that you can affect the game in so many ways. His energy level in press and half court was evident. It’s crazy how one guy can bring it like that, and it can rub off on the next guy who can rub off on the next guy.”
Not the least bit surprised that Gatkek and Lane could play such critical roles were Appleby and Fleming.
“They do it in practice every day so we weren’t surprised at how they can come out here and compete against another team,” Appleby said. He was Florida’s leading scorer with a career-high 21 points to go with three rebounds, four assists and three steals.
This was different than practice, however, but when given a chance to produce when the Gators needed them most, both Gatkek and Lane didn’t blink. They came through as if they’ve been doing this all year.
“They [coaches] told us before the game, if everyone did something that, one thing better than they have in the past and Niels and Tuong stepped up,” Fleming said. “They haven’t gotten as many minutes as they’ve wanted, but today they came in and made a great impact on the game.”
That Gatkek and Lane were in the game at the outset of the second half had everything to do with White’s utter disgust with the way the Gators played the first 20 minutes. When the Cowboys went on an 11-0 run that doubled up the score (32-16), the Gators were off the rails at both ends of the floor. UF didn’t defend and couldn’t hit a shot. Toward the end of the half, the Gators got into an offensive rhythm which stopped the bleeding somewhat. The Gators went into the halftime locker room down 45-32 when Appleby was fouled with two seconds to go and he hit both free throws.
How bad were the Gators defensively? In that first half, Oklahoma State hit 63.3 percent from the field overall and 70 percent (7-10) from the three-point line against a defense that okayed as if its feet were set in concrete. On the offensive end, the Gators were firing up SCUDs – 10-29 from the field and 5-20 from the three-point line.
Bad defense and another appearance by the gang that can’t shoot straight. What more could go wrong?
Perhaps the Gators expected a real tirade from White at halftime, but his outburst was confined to a single four-letter word. No, not one of those four-letter words you make it a point to avoid in mixed company nor was it one that would make comedian George Carlin’s list of the seven words you can never say on television.
“Soft, soft … that’s all he said,” Tyree Appleby said when asked about White’s halftime speech. “Soft.”
After he called his team soft, White decided to try something new so he altered his second half lineup substantially. The second half starters were Appleby and freshman Kowacie Reeves from the original starting five supplemented by freshman Elijah Kennedy, freshman Gatkek and sophomore Lane. On the bench were Fleming, Brandon McKissic and Anthony Duruji, who had started the game.
Fleming took the benching personally. Asked what hurt more, starting the second half on the bench or being called soft by White, Fleming answered, “Soft … don’t nobody call me soft.”
This was certainly a gamble on White’s part since Appleby was the only consistent scorer among the second half starters. Reeves has had a couple of 14-point games recently, but he’s still trying to figure things out so he’s up and down. Kennedy (30), Gatkek (13) and Lane (8) had combined for 51 points prior to Oklahoma State so who knew where the points were going to come from?
White didn’t know the answer to that question either, but he did expect his second half starters to play hard and perhaps inspire the guys that he would bring off the bench.
“We knew we had to shake something up,” White said. “Sometimes, honestly, you hate to admit it as a coach, but sometimes you are trying to tick a guy off or two. You’re trying to make a statement. Let’s just throw this lineup out there and maybe it will ignite somebody, and it did.”
Where the new lineup clicked was on the defensive end. White was pressing full court and then mixing up his half court defense practically every possession. If the Cowboys were cool, calm and collected in the first half, the pack of pit bulls they saw at the beginning of the final 20 minutes unnerved them. Their lack of a quality ball handler among their point guards was an issue that the Gators pounced upon to seize control of the game.
Oklahoma State had only four first half turnovers, but against Florida’s energized second half pressure, the Cowboys turned it over 12 times, which the Gators converted into 15 points. After hitting just about anything they threw up in the first half, Oklahoma State lost its touch and its offensive rhythm. The Cowboys were only 7-24 overall (29.1 percent) in the second half and only 1-8 (12.5 percent) from the three-point line.
The reason Oklahoma State went stone cold in the second half had everything to do with the energy the Gators brought defensively. In the first half, the Cowboys got into the paint at will, scoring 20 of their 45 points inside against a Florida defense that lacked the will to move its feet. Even though the Gators were playing shorthanded and vertically challenged against the taller Cowboys, White expected the kind of effort he saw the entire game in Knoxville, where the Gators lost 78-71 on Wednesday. Even playing the entire second half against Tennessee without Jitoboh, who suffered an eye injury that has required surgery and will keep him out the rest of the season, the Gators never lacked for effort.
“We are coming off a game where we played as hard as you can play,” White said. “We left every ounce of energy, fight, and level of physicality up in Knoxville.”
It was obvious the Gators were lacking in every possible way in the first half, but things changed in the second. Much of it had to do with all those new faces in the starting lineup. Unexpected visits to the bench can be a stark reminder that a coach is willing to take his chances with guys who will give him the effort he expects.
That four-letter word had quite an effect as well.
“No one likes to be called soft, but we played soft in the first half,” White said. “We just did. Part of that is Oklahoma State played very tough and confidently, but we were good in the second twenty.”
What happened in the second half is what the Gators are going to need if they are to remain competitive until Castleton can rejoin the lineup and provide an inside presence on both ends of the court. Without Castleton, the Gators are truly vertically challenged, but when they play with the energy, the hustle and determination they played with in the second half against Oklahoma State, they can overcome a number of deficiencies.
The next three games – at Missouri (Wednesday), then home the next two against Ole Miss and Georgia – are winnable if the Gators play as hard and as tough as they did in the last 20 minutes against Oklahoma State. Win the next three and the Gators will be sitting at 16 wins and 6-5 in SEC play with seven to go. A 6-5 record in league play might sound mediocre to some, but as the SEC/Big 12 Challenge proved (SEC won 6-4), the SEC is as good as any conference in the country. Any team that can win nine or more games in the SEC has an exceptional chance to make the NCAA Tournament. Even with five losses and a 3-5 record in league play, the Gators are only two games out of third place.
On paper this isn’t a team anyone would pick to make the NCAA Tournament but the games aren’t played on paper and any team that can play defense with the kind of ferocity we saw for a half Saturday, shouldn’t be discounted. The question is can the Gators play that hard consistently in the month of February? That’s what it will take to defy the odds and make the tournament despite so much adversity.
florida.rivals.com
