Our weekly look at SEC basketball:
* While Florida’s free fall continues, there is one thing that is obvious — KeVaughn Allen is really struggling. Especially away from the friendly confines of Exactech Arena. His bagel at Tennessee (and he only took three shots) was just the latest example of a guy who looks lost on the road. In SEC games away from home this season, Allen is shooting 27.7 percent and is averaging 5.4 points a game. And this from a player who was preseason All-SEC.
* OK, so I’m going to give you a blind resume and you tell me whether it should be in or out of the NCAA Tournament. The overall record is 17-11. But it does have 11 Quadrant 1 and 2 wins, six of them in Q1. It is counting on two big non-conference wins to sway the committee. Sounds a lot like Florida, right? It’s Alabama. The Tide does have RPI (30) working in its favor. But Alabama is not a big fan of the slide that Oklahoma is experiencing because the Sooners’ RPI has slipped that win down to a Q2 win.
* How many times have we looked at the SEC and said this league makes no sense? Well, again today. The league still might get a record eight teams in the tournament, but there are so many fighting to stay off the bubble you never know what it’s going to look like at the end. Basically, this is a league with a lot of good teams, one great team in Auburn (give the Tigers their due) and no really awful teams. That’s certainly a big improvement and the out-of-conference wins are still bolstering the overall RPI. But the results sometimes make no sense.
* Watch out because Kentucky seems to have righted the ship after going to Arkansas, falling behind 11-0 with the arena rocking and then blowing out the Razorbacks. This seems to be an annual occurrence of late with Kentucky. The Wildcats are the opposite of Florida in that they have found themselves offensively averaging 84 ppg in its last two wins while UF — which appears lost on offense — has averaged 61.3 ppg (in regulation) in its three straight losses. Mike White has been pushing his team to play better on defense and it has, but the Gators that we saw scoring the ball in November have disappeared.
Gee Pat, I don’t know, could it possibly have something to with the head coach?!
The head coach that went to the elite 8? Good to see the same fans that drive kur football coaches out of town one right after the other haven’t forgotten about basketball.
That’s a lot of our fanbase man. who this bum bf, Bill Flowers, Mikey,MIke, tebowcurse certainly isn’t. Screw it, disregard what he did just one year ago. Disregard key components missing…call for the coaches head! Man…who wouldn’t want to come here and coach?
Astroturfing. It’s a thing here. One guy tries to appear as some sort of grassroots movement. Whatever.
LT – McElwain had to go!!! His arrogance was ridiculous, his insubordination to his bosses indefensible, and he had “lost the locker room”. The one who ‘ran off’ McElwain was McElwain.
BF ==> Ban Forever
As far as the SEC, I think you said it best, Kevin, the 3rd place team is in a ”6 way tie”. That says it all about the parity of the middle of the pack for this league. U.F.’s KeVaughn Allen has struggled with ”his role” all year, and only he can pull himself out of this funk (other than the Arkansas game).
This Gator team is getting tired in games, it shows at the end of reg. This team isn’t the team it was at the beginning of the year because the team was an unknown back then. Now there’s a blueprint on how to beat Florida: keep them off the 3 point line, and they’ll rarely get more than a ”1 and done” on their offensive possession. But, none the less, ”Go Gators!”
Accurate assessment. Combine that with woeful shooting right now from our key guys and it’s a recipe for disaster. The home losses are the killers for going on the road is a tall order. Wasn’t surprised by this loss..
GO GATORS!
Sorry Pat, it was Kevin who said, ”the SEC’s 3rd place team is in a 6 way tie.”
I think:
UF should return Allen to his freshmen job, shoot 3’s. Maybe with only one job he can become shooter again? Spot up and shoot when ball come to him. No more ball handling. No one forced driving the lane.(only when defender jumps in air).
This team seems to be trying to hard to follow some mold.
Team need to play fast the whole game instead of using clock with leads, that has been total disaster.
Just lost to worst two teams in SEC UG and Vandy. then Tenn.
Remaining schedule auburn, bama, ky, then SEC tournament.
I do not see UF winning any more games.
I do not see them getting a NCAA invite.
They look like a team that will finish about 10th in final league standings.
Something is very wrong with this team.
I have noticed players looking over at coach after plays to see coach reaction. Players are not playing naturally.
They are trying to do what coach has told them.
I think coach is telling them the right things.
BUT all this changing them into different players, the players have lost who they are and what they did well.
That is shoot the ball very very well.
This should have been the best shooting team in UF history.
They look like they are playing hard.
They look like they have no B Ball IQ.
At this point I would love to see them have fun while they are playing.
Just go out and go crazy.
Try and score 100 pints.
After the season transfers may tell us something
The B Ball season is over.
I still like this team and coach, but can no longer watch the “train wreck” play and results. Painful to watch a team with this much skill play this bad.
Anyone know if Egbunu has officially quit. He should have quit a year ago.
Good news – baseball season has started, football has started up.
All of the other sports are nationally ranked.
MLB – started
Olympics – still going
Allen appears to be a good kid and that is primarily important. However when it comes to his shooting, you are either a great shooter almost every night (there will be some bad nights), or you are a “flash in the pan”. It appears that Allen is the latter. Whatever the reason, he is not living up to what we all believed he would be. I will stick though to my earlier comments that a team such as ours that blows leads in the second half, is either a poorly conditioned team, a poorly coached team or both. I think we are both.
Buzz Williams can remedy that.
The same Buzz Williams who left the cupboard absolutely bare at Marquette?
Emotionless coach = emotionless team🐊🏀
KA was a good shooter. He lost his stroke. He is being asked to do too much by a coach who is short handed and is looking for answers from players instead of the other way around. KA is not a ball handler. Any fan can see that. Likewise, KA is not a playmaker. KA cannot do what the coach is asking of him. As a result, his shooting has suffered, and the whole team is suffering because he is not scoring. It has had a snowball effect on the whole team. The whole team is in the same boat, being asked to do more and play out of position because we are short handed. This is not the solution. The coach is too close to the situation to see it. Go back and play everyone at their natural positions.
So one question then in response to Joel Roth: Who will be at the 4 position if you’re playing everyone at their natural positions? Egor is a Swing man as well as Stone and Hudson. Johnson can’t seem to get healthy and neither can Stokes or Egbunu. Any one of those big men would help Hayes out down low and we could actually play inside out. We have no experience, other than Hayes, yet down low and even though Bassett is playing better, he’s still playing like a freshman and Gak just isn’t fully healthy yet. It would be nice to see Bassett and Hayes play together but that leaves us short handed for the big men subs.
Problem is this: We have NO inside game, either we can’t or don’t trust Hayes or any other big men down on the block to score. Although I did notice this, we were pulling games out when White made a concentrated effort on getting Stone and Hayes touches in the post and letting them work. I say do that again, for doubles to come their way and then kick it back out. It’s worked before and works for other teams.
I agree that playing Allen at PG when Chiozza sits has contributed to the downturn in his game. He seems to have lost his best purpose on the court, which should be to score and score often. No more point guard play for K. Allen, I say. Let his one job be to find an open spot and shoot the basketball.