Gators Fall In Final Minutes At Kentucky

To see Nick play so well, and to see his teammates so stymied and unable to help him, really bothered me. I saw effort from Tyus, and even Werner/Parsons (who you complained about) but the execution was not there.

The turnovers were completely ridiculous. And I think Hodge’s “arm-step” on Stevenson was the turning point of the game. We just couldn’t afford to lose his steady contribution at that point.

Road game against a decent, but not great, or even “good” team in the grand scheme. It is a rivalry game and we played them tough in Rupp, but it feels like we should have won this one. It’s an empty feeling.

I’ll give Tyus a bit of a pass this time because he did show flashes (again), has played pretty well for 2 straight games and did a pretty good job defending Patterson, even though he is too small and too weak to really play center….but Warner? come on. The guy appears to be getting worse. I used to not get upset over his play because I just accepted that he was short on talent an at least he hustled and was good for a steal and easy bucket or two a game. But now, all he does it dribble off his foot, commit stupid fouls, miss layups and can’t get a rebound to save his life. Plus, he REALLY needs to stop hoisting up 3s. Hey Werner – you are shooting 33% from behind the arc. PLEASE stop. You are in the game to grab rebounds, and when you clank 3s, there is one less player underneath to get the board.

Speaking of “please stop shooting 3s,” Parsons….PLEASE, PLEASE, STOP!!!! you my friend, are a 30% shooter from behind the arc. When shooting from anywhere in front of the arc – you are a 62% shooter. See where I’m going with this? In making that calculation, I can’t help but notice that Parsons has taken 195 total shots this season….92 of them from behind the arc! That is absurd. the only 3 players I want shooting the 3 are Calathes, Walker and Hodge. They are the only guys that don’t prompt me to yell “NO!!” as shoot as they square up from downtown. Instead, Parsons should concentrate on being a rebounder. How is the world is our point guard the leading rebounder on the team in SEC games?!?

Hodge is also pretty disappointing this season. He was once known as our best 3 point shooter, but now isn’t much better than Warner or Parsons from 3-point land. Also, his drives to the hoop get easily swatted a lot more often than they used to. I am not sure what the arm step thing was all about – it seemed unintentional, but then again, he should probably be more aware fo what is happening on the court. Howver, given his 2 points, 3 assists and 3 turnovers on 20 minutes last night, I wouldn’t exactly say we missed “his steady contribution.” In fact, I would venture to guess that if Patterson hadn’t gonoe down, Kentucky would have pulled away and won this one by 10-12 points. We had to answer for Patterson at the time he was injured.

I don’t see much inprovement for this team on the horizon. They are a team that can handily beat weak OOC oponents, are very tough at home, but not very good on the road. Unfortunately, no tournament (real tourney at least) games are played at home. I am not sure why Vargas still isn’t getting any minutes, but I would sacrifice Warner’s stellar play right now for a 5-10 minutes of a raw Vargas to see what he can do in a live SEC game. All that being said – I predict wins at UGA and 3 of the 4 remaining home games (sole loss to UT maybe?), and losses at MSU And LSU. That would mean a 23-8 record and 10-6 in the conference, which should be enough to us into the tournament with an SEC tourney win or two.

I hope that Calathes stays around and that Macklin steps up next season….because I think that Kadji will eventually be good and we appear to have another good class coming in next season. One of these big guys has to pan out? right Erik Murphy?!!?

And I still haven’t gotten the HD box set up. HDMI cables won’t work and the component cables were faulty. Next game’s Saturday, right? I got time…