A brief note on things: I have an incredible amount of writing — think a paper in every class, and then some — to do over the rest of my semester here at UF, so I'm probably going to be a bit more scarce than usual in the coming couple of weeks. With Florida's football season sort of on hold until we have an official announcement on the Gators' bowl, I'll hopefully be able to do a little less around here without y'all noticing too much.
Florida topped Stetson, 96-70, in Orlando. But that win was probably a little closer than the score indicates.
The Gators got points from Brad Beal (22 of them, matching his season/career high, to go with 10 rebounds) and Erving Walker (21, a season high) and a season-high 14 threes, got a career-high 10 points from Will Yeguete, who recorded his first double-double, and got 17 Hatters turnovers from their press.
But they also went cold in the first half, giving up a 12-0 run that cut their lead to single digits, and struggled with a 2-3 zone in advance of a Friday showdown at Syracuse, and saw Patric Young score just nine points to go with three rebounds, despite one tremendous block. And while those 14 threes were nice, they came on 35 shots from beyond the arc; Florida's reliance on perimeter shooting is troubling, if only because there's always a chance that most of the shooters will end up going cold one night and leaving the Gators in a deep hole behind a team that can pound out possessions inside.
I'm not saying this isn't an excellent Florida team; it is. But it's not one without weaknesses, and if Syracuse can stick to its 2-3 zone and get lucky with a Gator or two missing shots, we may be talking about those weaknesses after a loss on Friday.