The game was falling the way it needed to fall for us to have a good chance at winning it as the underdog. Mike White comes out in what I believe was one of his best game plans of the year with us using the zone to start the game. Florida was in a funk and rattled and we were the better coached team in the first half. We were hitting threes. It was beautiful. Things got wonky in the second half. We went away from the zone and they killed us on the boards in the second half. They pounded it inside over and over with their bigs and it looked like we would have no answer. But as always, we never quit, battled to the end and kept it close. Oh yeah, there was also a billion fouls called that killed almost all flow.
Surprise of the Night & the SEC Tourney
In two SEC tournament games we shot over 40% from three each game. That's pretty wild. And it came from some unlikely places tonight. Melendez (3), James (1), and Sunny (1) combined to go 5 for 6 from three in the game. That's pretty nuts.
Stats of the Night:
UGA up by 3 on the boards at half, gets out rebounded by 18 in the second half.
Fastbreak Points: 23 Fla; 9 UGA
Toughest Stat:
Todd Golden 5-0 versus Mike White. Florida has had more talent in all five games but we also have/had the ability to do something about that.
What's next?
It's portal watch now. Which of our players leave and which stay? Dash has hinted that a ton of our older guys could be out the door. Also, what players from other teams do our coaches start contacting as they enter the portal?
Portal season is an exciting time. Here are some portal rules to remember:
1. If one of our players are going to portal out, we need them to do so immediately so we can plan accordingly. We don't need any last minute decisions about leaving from our key guys. It puts us in a real bind.
2. If a guy visits, there is a great chance he commits to us. It seems we hit on about 80-90% of them. On visits that we have known about, only Sahvir Wheeler and Amaree Abram didnt commit to us. The rest of the visits the last two years ended up committing, I believe (someone correct me if I'm off here).
3. The portal never really sleeps. There were big fish making decisions all the way into June and July last year. With that said, we need some momentum, so it would help us to snag some serious talent early and get other players excited about joining us.
Appreciate all the folks interacting on these postgame threads. Always great talking UGA hoops. May this be our best off season yet. Go Dawgs!
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