Gator Basketball Raises Playing Level

I'm wondering a little this morning whether the University of Florida men's basketball team read my blog article a few days ago, in which I claimed that they, outstanding season so far notwithstanding, had fallen into the pattern of playing down to their opponent's level.  After all, they had bested a very good, NCAA tourney-bound Kentucky on the road in a close contest by playing strong defense, pulling away in the closing minutes.  Then they struggled unexpectedly in three consecutive games against inferior opponents, all contests up in the air until the very end.  But now they've gotten two more games behind them, and it looks as if the Gators have risen to my challenge, whether or not (probably not) they did read my article...A few days ago they blasted LSU 79-61 (it was actually 77-48 before the subs came in).  Then, last night they dominated South Carolina in the second half on the way to a 72-46 drubbing.  Now that's the kind of confidence-building play I wanted to see, and it couldn't come at a better time than the end of the regular season, just in time for the Southeastern Conference and NCAA tournaments.

Speaking of the SEC tournament, it is set up in a peculiar manner, with two "rounds" occurring before the quarterfinals...and it is this quarterfinal round in which Florida, naturally top-seeded, begins its tournament play as one of the surviving eight teams.  But I suppose this inequity of two extra games that the lowest seeded teams have to get through is the price they had to pay for floundering though the regular season.  And I understand that the number of SEC teams, fourteen, doesn't make it easy to set up an elimination tournament.  Sixteen teams would be ideal for the purpose (although I think we have too many schools in the SEC as it is), with everybody having to win four games to win the championship.  Still, no one team should have to play two more total tourney games than another...this would have easily been remedied if they had given the top two seeded schools the bye into the quarterfinals and had the other twelve matched off by their seeding in the first round...still getting the needed quarterfinal total to eight teams.  I suppose, though, that being a Florida fan it doesn't much matter since the Gators are going to be "off" for a while within the tournament until their game comes up...

But that tournament isn't the immediate concern for Florida: they have a chance to go undefeated, 18-0, in conference regular season play.  All they have to do now is win the finale, scheduled for this Saturday.  They'll be playing at home, but their opponent will be those pesky Kentucky Wildcats again.  Now that should be one good game...