NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Florida, the team, was not playing well. Neither was KeVaughn Allen, the Gators' leading scorer. Enter Arkansas, which was been fodder for the latter for four seasons, and after Thursday's win in second-round action of the Southeastern Conference Tournament just may turn out to be a 2019 elixir for the former.
Think about it.
The Gators were struggling back in January when they went to Fayetteville early in the SEC campaign and stole a big one on the road against the Razorbacks; one they absolutely had to have at the time. Then came Thursday. UF had lost three straight and were one defeat from abandoning all hope for an NCAA Tournament at-large berth, but righted itself by coming alive in the second half on the way to a 66-50 victory at Bridgestone Arena.
"I'm not sure it has as much to do with the matchup as it [does] leading into both games with our mentality [and] where we were in the context of the season," UF coach Mike White.
Whatever the case, contextually, the Gators are in a much better place now than when they arrived in the Music City, following yet another get-well performance against the Hogs.
Freshman forward Keyontae Johnson posted a double-double, scoring a career-high 20 points and grabbing 12 rebounds, while Allen, the native Arkansan, broke out of a horrific shooting slump by scoring 17 points against the Ozark State's flagship program, with both players adding active hands to a fabulous collective defensive effort that held the Razorbacks to 22 second-half points.
The 50-point total was a season-low for Arkansas, one less than the handcuffing Florida did in winning 57-51 when the two played Jan. 9.
"We pride ourselves on our defense," Allen said after his team held the Hogs without a field goal over the final 7:55 of the game. "We played hard and stuck together."
The win, the program's first at the tournament in three years, moved Florida (18-14) into Friday's quarterfinal round to face ninth-ranked and top-seeded LSU (26-5), which had byes through the first two rounds after winning its first regular-season conference championship since 2009. In the bigger "March Madness" picture, the victory may have been — again, maybe — the one that nudged the Gators off the bubble and squeezed UF into the NCAA field of 68 teams that will be announced Sunday night.
A win Friday definitely will do the trick.
"This is great for us," Gators freshman point guard Andrew Nembhard said after scoring six points and dishing eight assists to just one turnover over 38 minutes. "We started the tournament off with a win and 'K5' playing well."
Freshman forward Keyontae Johnson was on the attack against the Razorbacks on his way to a career-high 20 points, plus 12 rebounds in his SEC Tournament debut game.
Allen, out of Little Rock, came into the game having totaled just 12 points over the previous three games — all losses — on just 3-for-22 shooting overall and 2-for-13 from the 3-point line. Against the Razorbacks (17-15), he knocked down six of his 14 field-goal attempts, plus three of seven 3-balls over 33 minutes to run his career average against Arkansas to 16.0 points per game, compared to 11.9 against everyone else.
"He's from the state of Arkansas. He wants to perform well against the Razorbacks," Hogs coach Mike Anderson said. "I think his experience kind of paid off for him, made some plays for him down the stretch."
Johnson, meanwhile, had arguably his finest game in a UF uniform, making eight of his 14 shots, including three of five 3-point attempts, to go with his dozen rebounds, six coming on the offensive end, as the Gators won resoundingly on the glass, 41-26. When he was done, Johnson was the first Florida freshman to tally a double-double in the SEC Tournament since Donnell Harvey got 11 points and 12 rebounds in a win over Ole Miss in 2000.
"I think I played well," Johnson said. "Just got to keep it up."
If the Gators keep up their defense they'll continue to give themselves a chance. UF led 30-28 at halftime, but the Razorbacks shot 50 percent for the period. In the second half, Florida got more aggressive on both ends. Arkansas shot just 25 percent after halftime — its last field goal came on an offensive rebound and putback by Mason Jones with just under eight minutes remaining — and attacked the paint and glass enough on offense to get to the free-throw line 18 times, where the Gators converted 14.
"We were playing to their tempo," said Hogs All-SEC Freshman team guard Isaiah Joe, who finished with 12 points. "Whenever we don't play our tempo, it's hard to get into our sets. They like the slower tempo than we do. We played to it."
The Jones basket made it a three-point game, at 47-44, but Allen dropped a 3 on the next possession, followed by a driving floater from Johnson that pushed the UF margin to eight, its largest lead to that point. The two teams swapped free throws over the next three possessions, still leaving Arkansas within six, but an Allen take, a Johnson floater and dagger 3-pointer from Nembhard made it a 13-point lead with less than three minutes to go.
Now, the Gators get LSU, a team they've played twice over the previous 16 days, both of which went to overtime, with road teams winning each. Wonder what the third meeting with bring?
"I don't know if my heart can take another one," White said.
