Beal, Prather lead Gators to 71-45 win over Cavs
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) -- So much for Virginia's vaunted defense shutting down Florida's up-tempo offense.
Even
on a day when the Gators couldn't find the basket with their
3-pointers, they had no trouble beating the Cavaliers 71-45 Friday in
the NCAA Midwest Regional.
Bradley Beal had 14 points and 11
rebounds, reserve Casey Prather scored a career-high 14 and Florida
pulled away in the second half.
The Gators finished the first
half on a 17-4 run to shake off a slow start and get out to a 30-22
lead. They shot 70 percent in the second half and pushed their
advantage to more than 20 points with 8 minutes left.
No. 7
seed Florida (24-10), which made it to the regional finals last season,
came into the game averaging a nation-leading 9.9 3-pointers a game but
made only 4 of 23. The Gators were 24 of 30 from inside the arc,
though.
Mike Scott had 15 points for Virginia (22-10), which was in the tournament for the first time since 2007.
The
teams' second all-time meeting, and first since the 1992 NIT
semifinals, was billed as a clash between Virginia's pack-line defense
and Florida's up-tempo perimeter offense.
Florida missed its
first 13 shots from behind the arc. No matter. The Gators dominated the
offensive glass, with 10 of their first 19 points coming on second
chances as they seemingly knifed through Virginia's defense at will for
putbacks.
Patric Young's beauty of a tip-in on Kenny Boynton's
missed jumper got the Gators within two points early -- after they fell
behind 10-2 -- and back-to-back putbacks by Prather and Beal gave
Florida its first lead, 19-18.
Scottie Wilbekin finally
connected for his team's first 3-pointer with 1:07 left in the half to
push the advantage to 30-22. Virginia made only two field goals the
last 8 minutes.
It took a bit for the Gators to adjust to the
pack-line, which essentially is a man-to-man system that starts with
each Virginia player stationed along an imaginary arc about 16 feet
from the basket. A defender doesn't cross the line unless his man gets
the ball. When the ball is passed, the defender goes back to the pack
and a different defender goes out to cover his man.
If the
ball penetrates the pack, defenders collapse on the player with the
ball and work to force a turnover. That's what happened on Florida's
first possession, with Young getting called for traveling as the
defense collapsed on him.
The Gators turned over the ball four times in the first 5 minutes, then just three times the rest of the half.
Though they were 1 of 15 on 3s the first half, they made 11 of 15 inside the arc.
Boynton,
who came into the game having made 10 of his last 31 3s, was just 3 of
10 overall and 0 for 5 on 3s and finished with eight points -- half his
team-leading average.
Prather and Beal picked up the slack, as did Young, who had dunks on three of his first four field goals and finished 6 for 6.
Things
unraveled for Virginia so much in the second half that when Sammy
Zeglinski made an easy pass to Scott on a two-on-one break, Scott let
the ball hit his hands and go out of bounds as he approached the basket
with Prather trailing a step behind him.
Beal hit a 3 on the other end, and Florida was up 51-32. Game over.
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