Hotty-Toddy! Allen, Gators Shoot White to Homecoming Win

Saturday, January 16

Oxford, MS

8:00 PM

Florida Gators

Ole Miss

KeVaughn Allen tears past SEC scoring leader Stefan Moody in Saturday's win at Ole Miss. Allen finished with 27 points, including 6-for-7 from the 3-point line. Moody had 22.

Hotty-Toddy! Allen, Gators Shoot White to Homecoming Win

Sunday, January 17, 2016 | Men's Basketball, Chris Harry

Box Score

By: Chris Harry, Senior Writer

OXFORD, Miss. -- Well, Mike White did say the game was going to be weird.

And anyone who had watched his Florida basketball team's cockeyed shooting most of the year probably had to rub their eyes or adjust their televisions Saturday night at the sight of the Gators -- especially, freshman guard KeVaughn Allen -- raining shots from the get-go in Saturday night's wire-to-wire 80-71 road victory at Ole Miss.

Allen scorched the Rebels for 27 points, hitting nine of his 11 shots from the floor and a ridiculous 6-for-7 from the 3-point line to go with six rebounds and lead the Gators (11-6, 3-2) to just their third Southeastern Conference road win the last two seasons. Senior forward Dorian Finney-Smith scored 17 points and grabbed 10 rebounds for his fourth double-double of the season and had a big hand in snapping a seven-game losing streak in league play dating to a win over Alabama on Jan. 27, 2015.

Meanwhile, the alternating point guard duo of Chris Chiozza (career-high nine assists) and Kasey Hill (11 points, 4-for-5 from the free-throw line) tag-teamed Rebels guard Stefan Moody (24.4 points, 4.1 assists per game) on the defensive end, holding the SEC's scoring leader to 22 points and frustrating the league's best shot-maker into just 5-for-16 from the floor, 2-for-10 from the arc, one assist and six turnovers.

It all made for a feel-good flight back to Gainesville for the UF team and their coach, White, who was a four-year starting point guard at Mississippi in the 1990s and served seven more seasons there as an assistant coach.

UF coach Mike White talks to point guard Kasey Hill on the way to guiding the Gators an 80-71 defeat of his alma mater Saturday night. White was the Rebels starting point guard for four seasons during the 1990s and an assistant coach there for seven in the 2000s.

"I love this place. Always have, always will," White said after his happy homecoming, as the Gators handed the Rebels (12-5, 2-3) their first loss in the new $96 million Pavilion at Ole Miss. "Obviously, this was special for me, but more important was to get a quality win for this team that really needed to break through on the road. Winning on the SEC road is very, very difficult. But we played a solid defensive game and shot the ball well."

How 'bout a season-best 62 percent in the first half? UF jumped to an 8-0 lead, forcing Rebels coach Andy Kennedy to take a timeout. UM scored on its ensuing possession, but Justin Leon answered with a 3-pointer to start a run of seven more consecutive points to give the Gators a 13-point lead.

"With the way we play defense, if we hit shots, we can be a great team," Finney-Smith said.

Allen bombed two 3-pointers in the final minute of the half, finishing 5-for-6 from deep for the period, to give the Gators a 19-point lead at intermission. The margin didn't dip below double digits until the final 11 seconds of the game.

"The one guy that you can't leave is the one guy that really took complete control of the game. KeVaughn Allen is a good player," said Kennedy, whose team shot 38.5 percent in the first half, nearly 24 percent less than UF (and more than half below Allen's 87.5 on 7-for-8 marksmanship). "We made an emphasis all week that this is the one guy that you cannot let get going because if he gets going, he's capable of putting up huge numbers. I think we all witnessed that."

Allen's performance, which played out in front of his parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles from less than three hours away Little Rock, Ark., wasn't a big surprise; not after he went on a five-game tear during which he averaged 18 points, including a 32-point breakout display against Florida State.

But over the previous two games, Allen hit just four of 18 attempts and went scoreless four nights earlier in a loss at No. 21 Texas A&M.

Welcome back, kid.

"I just have to continue to play hard and be more aggressive," Allen said.

Said Finney-Smith: "He's a man of few words ... but he can put it in the goal."

Ah, putting the ball in the goal. That, of course, has been Florida's biggest problem this season. The Gators came into the game ranked last in the SEC in field-goal percentage (.415), 3-point percentage (.290) and free-throw percentage (.606). They went cold in the second half (30 percent), but hit enough big shots (3 of 6 from deep) and rattled in enough free throws (16 of 25 after the break) to keep Ole Miss and its 50-percent second-half shooting at bay.

After the game, Finney-Smith put rhetorical question to White about beating his alma mater.

"Did it hurt?"

"No," White shot back. "I'm a Gator."

Weird, but in a good way. Like his team's shooting.