Oliver Barry, CRS, GRI
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From: JunoGator <broadreachfsc@earthlink.net>
Date: January 24, 2013 3:18:03 PM CST
To: GatorNEWS Lyons <gatornews@googlegroups.com>
Subject: [gatornews] Aloha GatorNEWS from the Palm Beach Post and Miami Herald, courtesy of JunoGator
Reply-To: gatornews+owners@googlegroups.com
No. 8 Florida starts slow but beats Georgia 64-47
By | The Associated PressATHENS, Ga. (AP) -- Scottie Wilbekin helped No. 8 Florida get through a sluggish first half.His teammates took it from there.
Wilbekin matched a career high with 17 points - scoring 13 before halftime - and the Gators romped past another Southeastern Conference opponent, beating Georgia 64-47 on Wednesday night.
Florida (15-2, 5-0 SEC) trailed 27-24 at the break, making just 1 of 9 attempts beyond the 3-point arc. But the Gators quickly turned things around after the break. Wilbekin and Mike Rosario hit consecutive 3s and forced Georgia into three straight turnovers.
The Gators led the rest of way, holding Georgia (7-11, 1-4) to only one field goal in the first 11 1-2 minutes of the second half.
''My shots were falling,'' Wilbekin said. ''They were opening up the lane. I was able to drive in the first half. They made it easy for me.''
Everyone else was struggling, but the Gators looked more familiar in the second half. Florida knocked down 7 of 11 from outside the stripe and turned up the defensive pressure, limiting Georgia to 32 percent shooting (6 of 19) from the field. The Bulldogs finished with 17 turnovers, compared to just seven for Florida.
''We knew it was going to be a grind-it-out, physical game,'' Gators coach Billy Donovan said. ''They were not going to get in a running game with us. They were going to run some clock. They forced us to dig a little deeper.''
Despite never leading in the first half, Florida added to its run of dominance in conference play. The Gators have won their first five SEC games by an average of nearly 25 points.
Wilbekin, who was averaging 8.3 points a game, equaled his career best from a November victory over Central Florida. Kenny Boyntonadded 14 points, while Erik Murphy had 13.
''Scottie and the Georgia turnovers kept us close,'' Donovan said. ''We could've been down 10 or 12. To only be down by three at the half, we were fortunate.''
Florida already had beaten Georgia 77-44 two weeks ago in Gainesville, but the Bulldogs were more competitive in this one, at least for a half. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope led the home team with 16 points.
No other Georgia player was in double figures.
''A tale of two halves,'' Bulldogs coach Mark Fox said. ''We didn't start the second half well at all. We just couldn't stabilize our defense in the second half. We just couldn't find a way to get stops in the second half, and they shot the ball very well.''
Before a half-filled Stegeman Coliseum, the Bulldogs went right at the Gators from the opening tip, scoring the first six points and quickly building an 11-2 lead. Florida tied it a couple of times but, surprisingly, never had the lead before the break.
Georgia stayed on top with accurate shooting from beyond the arc, knocking down 6 of 11 by halftime. The Gators, by comparison, made just 1 of 9.
Caldwell-Pope finished off the half by swishing a long 3-pointer just before the buzzer, sending the Bulldogs racing off the court with the lead.
It didn't last.
''We were feeling good about the first half,'' Caldwell-Pope said. ''We just wanted to throw the first punch, and we did. To start the second half, we gave up a couple of 3s and the momentum.''
Florida has won 17 of the last 20 in the series and made up for a 76-62 loss in Athens late last season.
''We remembered what happened last year,'' Wilbekin said. ''We weren't going to let that happen again.''
Georgia was coming off its first SEC win of the season, a 67-58 victory over LSU. But the Bulldogs just didn't have enough talent or depth to knock off the Gators, having already lost non-conference games at home to Youngstown State, Southern Miss and Iona.
''They played harder than us in the first half,'' Boynton said. ''Coach wanted us to come out in the second half and, no matter what we had going offensively, just get back together on defense. We tried to push up on them defensively in the second half to take away their 3-point shots and force them to drive.''
It worked. After doing so much damage from 3-point range, the Bulldogs got off only one long-range attempt in the final 20 minutes (and made it, too).
The Bulldogs' offensive woes were summed up by Kenny Gaines, who went up for a dunk with about 5 minutes left but didn't even clear the rim. The crowd groaned, many of them deciding that was a good time to head for home.
By the end, there were only a smattering of fans left, most of them wearing blue.
Recap: Georgia vs. Florida
BY SPORTS NETWORK
THE SPORTS NETWORK
Scottie Wilbekin scored a game-high 17 points on 7-of-9 shooting from the floor, while Will Yeguete donated seven points, four steals and 11 rebounds, as No. 8 Florida overcame a slow start to record a 64-47 victory over the Georgia Bulldogs on Wednesday.
Kenny Boynton added 14 points and Erik Murphy contributed 13 for the Gators (15-2, 5-0 SEC), who have won seven straight games and 17 of the last 20 in the series versus Georgia.
Kentavious Caldwell-Pope scored 16 points and pulled down seven boards for the Bulldogs (7-11, 1-4), who have lost four of their last five. Charles Mann added nine points and shot 2-of-2 from behind the arc.
"It was almost a tale of two halves," Georgia head coach Mark Fox said. "As well as we started the first half, we didn't start the second half well at all. We just couldn't stabilize our defense in the second half. We just couldn't find a way to get stops in the second half, and they shot the ball very well. You have to give them credit for that. They've got a really good team and I was disappointed in our second half performance tonight, but it was up against a very good team and we have to give credit to them."
Florida never held a lead in the first half and went into the break down 27-24, but outscored Georgia by a 40-20 margin in the second half to remain unbeaten in SEC play and sweep the season series.
Florida's struggles were evident early on, as the Gators trailed by as many as nine, 11-2, just four minutes in.
The Gators fought back with a 12-4 run highlighted by 10 Wilbekin points, however, to trail by just one with 11-plus minutes left in the first half.
Georgia kept up its intensity, however, and made four 3-pointers -- including two by Mann over the final 10 1/2 minutes of the half to go up by a 27-24 score at the break. The Bulldogs limited Florida to a mere 1-of-9 success rate from 3-point range in the opening period, in which the Gators shot just 40.7 percent.
The Bulldogs' success didn't register over to the second half, however, as the Gators opened up the stanza on a 21-4 run - started by back-to-back treys from Wilbekin and Mike Rosario treys - to build a 45-31 lead at the midway stage. Caldwell-Pope made 1-of-2 free throws to end the surge, but the damage was already too much for the home team to overcome.
Florida and its third-ranked scoring defense, which was limiting opponents to 51.7 points per game coming in, held Georgia to 31.6 percent shooting in the second half. The Bulldogs also made just one 3-pointer on their only attempt after intermission, after shooting 6-of-11 from downtown in the first half.
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