UF eyes NIT visit to ‘Garden’
GAINESVILLE (AP) – There’s nothing Florida can do now to make up for missing the NCAA tournament.
Not even three more wins and an NIT championship would ease the pain of being out of the tournament for the second straight year. So the Gators merely are trying to make the best of a bad situation.
“I think we all know that if we’re going to play, we’re going to try to win,” guard Nick Calathes said Monday. “We’re all winners. If we’re going to be in it, let’s win it.”
Motivated by being left out of the NCAA field, Florida has responded with two of its best games of the season in the NIT. The Gators (25-10) shot a combined 54 percent from the field and 42 percent from three-point range in double-digit wins over Jacksonville and Miami, and held both opponents to less than 63 points.
Florida hopes to continue its postseason prowess Tuesday against Penn State (24-11), with the winner advancing to the NIT semifinals in New York.
Although Calathes and his teammates said they would rather have been one and done in the NCAA tournament than settle for another trip to Madison Square Garden – the Gators lost to Massachusetts in the NIT semifinals last year – they haven’t let it affect them on the court.
Calathes snapped out of a shooting slump and scored 40 points in the first two NIT games. Chandler Parsons, out of the starting lineup after struggling down the stretch, has 24 points, 18 rebounds and eight assists off the bench.
Maybe more impressive has been Florida’s defense. The pressing, trapping, zone-oriented Gators – defenses designed to hide the team’s lack of size and athleticism – causes turnovers and forces tough shots.
Jacksonville shot 37 percent from the floor and was 6-of-23 from three-point range. Miami shot 41 percent and was 7-of-25 from behind the arc.
“There’s no pressure,” guard Walter Hodge said. “We just play. We wanted to get to the tournament, but we just have to play what we’ve got.”
Now, the Gators have a chance to make a fourth consecutive “final four,” a bittersweet accomplishment for a program that followed consecutive national championships with consecutive NIT berths.
“We want to get to the NCAA tournament,” Calathes said. “That’s our goal in the beginning of the year. Obviously, we didn’t make our goal.”
The Gators fell short. Players were disappointed, but coach Billy Donovan said Monday they overachieved.