Florida Gators
Ole Miss
Gators One Win Away From Third Straight SEC Tournament Title
Sunday, March 11, 2007 | Men's Basketball
Florida is one win away from a three-peat at the Southeastern Conference tournament.
Corey Brewer scored 22 points, Lee Humphrey added 17 and the sixth-ranked Gators put on another dominating display to beat Mississippi 80-59 in the SEC semifinals Saturday.
Defending national champion Florida (28-5) jumped out to a quick 11-point lead and was never seriously challenged by the Rebels (20-12), who might have cost themselves a chance to slip into the NCAA field.
Florida has won its first two games in the tournament by an average of 19 points to reach its fourth straight SEC final. The Gators won the last two championships and have a chance to be the first team since Kentucky in 1997-99 to win three straight tournament titles.
"I think we play our best basketball when tournament season starts," Brewer said.
Florida advanced to play Arkansas in Sunday's championship game. The Razorbacks knocked off Mississippi State 81-72 in the other semifinal.
Ole Miss shot just 32 percent from the field (21-of-66). Clarence Sanders was the Rebels' lone player in double figures with 21 points.
Taurean Green added 14 points for Florida, which buried the Rebels by going 10-of-24 from beyond the 3-point arc. Humphrey was especially accurate, making 5-of-8 outside the stripe.
After blowing out Georgia in the quarterfinals with the first 17 points of the game, Florida got off to another quick start. Brewer and Green connected from 3-point range and Al Horford scored on the inside to make it 13-2 with the game barely five minutes old.
Ole Miss called a quick timeout and pulled itself together, making a game of it by late in the first half despite abysmal shooting. The Rebels whittled Florida's lead to 30-22 and had the ball with less than two minutes remaining, but the Gators used one of their patented quick strikes to restore a comfortable margin.
Humphrey connected on his third 3-pointer of the half, Green made a couple of free throws and Walter Hodge burst to the basket for a layin after an Ole Miss turnover, sending Florida to the locker room with its biggest lead to that point, 37-22.
Brewer scored 10 points before halftime and Humphrey added nine with his accuracy beyond the arc.
A similar spurt in the second half finished off the Rebels. After Sanders missed a jumper that could have closed the gap to single digits, Brewer and Humphrey swished 3s, then Green drove for a layup that capped a 13-2 run with 9 1/2 minutes to go.
That gave Florida a 62-41 lead, its biggest of the day, and the Gators stretched the margin as high as 25 points before letting up at the end.
Clearly, the Gators have gotten past that little hiccup at the end of February, when they lost three of four games. Now, they're a front-runner for a No. 1 seed in the NCAA field.
"We went through a tough stretch," Humphrey said. "We weren't executing on offense and defense. But we're starting to put it together."
Game Notes
- All-Time Series: Florida leads, 56-41 (Florida has won the last six meetings)
- SEC Tournament: Florida leads, 4-2 (Previous Meeting: Ole Miss 74, Florida 69 in 2001 semifinals)
- Season Series: Florida won, 1-0 (Only Meeting: Florida 79, Ole Miss 70 on Jan. 20 in Gainesville)
- Tomorrow's championship game will be the eighth inter-divisional SEC Tournament final since league expansion in 1992. The East has a 6-1 record in the previous East-West championship matchups with Mississippi State (1996 over Kentucky) being the only West team to down an East team in the title game.
- Florida and Arkansas have met twice in the SEC Tournament, splitting the games. Florida downed the Razorbacks, 74-71, in last year's quarterfinals while Arkansas won, 75-74, in the 1999 quarterfinals.
- Florida, which began its quarterfinal win over Georgia on a 17-0 run, opened the game on a 13-2 run after an Al Horford bucket at the 14:56 mark. Ole Miss closed the lead to four points (15-11), but Florida quickly returned the lead to double-digits and ended the half on a 7-0 run for a 37-22 lead at intermission.
- Ole Miss struggled shooting the ball, especially in the first half and into the opening minutes of the second stanza. At the first media timeout of the second half (15:30), Clarence Sanders was 7-of-14 from the field with 17 points while the remainder of the Rebel team was 6-of-25 from the floor with 15 points. The Rebels shot just 28 percent (9-of-32) in the first half.
- Florida's 21-point margin of victory is the largest in a semifinal game for an SEC team since Kentucky downed Arkansas, 99-74, in the 1998 event here in Atlanta.
Ole Miss Notes
- Ole Miss now is 20-12and had a modest two-game winning streak snapped.
- Ole Miss had 22 first-half points, its lowest scoring output in the first 20 minutes of games this season. The previous low was a 23-point first half at Alabama (a 69-58 loss).
- Todd Abernethy had eight points and with his last bucket became the 29th player in Ole Miss history to record 1,000 career points. Abernethy has exactly 1,000 points for his Rebel career.
- Clarence Sanders finished with 21 points, his 11th game of 20 or more points this season.
- Greg Hardy, a walk-on who is a scholarship player for the Rebel football team, scored six points, a career high. His previous high was three points at Florida on Jan. 20 in Gainesville. His four rebounds were one shy of his career best of five boards.
- Kenny Williams pulled down 12 rebounds, just one shy of his career high of 13 set against Alabama A&M on Dec. 22 in Oxford.
Florida Notes
- Florida now is 28-5 and has won three games in a row.
- Florida becomes just the third team in SEC Tournaement history to reach the championship game in four-consecutive seasons. Kentucky (numerous times) and Alabama (1989-92) reached the title game four years in a row (or more).
- Florida has won eight-straight SEC Tournament games and 10 of its last 11 overall.
- This is Florida's seventh appearance in the SEC Tournament championship game. The Gators are 2-4 in title games, having won the last two crowns (2005 over Kentucky, 70-53; 2006 over South Carolina, 49-47).
- Corey Brewer finished with 22 points, a season high. His previous high was 20 points set Jan. 24 at Mississippi State.
- Al Horford finished with nine points and 13 rebounds with the rebound total just one off from his season high of 14 set at Mississippi State on Jan. 24. He narrowly missed his 14th double-double this season for the second night in a row as Horford had 15 points and nine rebounds Friday against Georgia.
- Lee Humphrey finished with 17 points and with 999 career points is one shy of becoming the 42nd player in Florida history to score 1,000 career points. Humphrey's first point in the title game will add him to the list of Gator starters (Corey Brewer, Taurean Green, Joakim Noah, Al Horford are the others) who all have 1,000 career points.
