GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The Florida Gators woke up Saturday on a two-game losing streak during which their offense utterly collapsed in the final minutes due to missed shots and turnovers (lots of turnovers) that melted late leads into frustrating deficits and gut-check defeats. 

The game against Georgia Saturday afternoon was more of the same, except for the deficit and defeat parts. For that, UF coach Mike White was thankful. 

"I don't like how we finished. Our guys don't like it either," White said after his team withstood (barely) some ferocious late-game pressure from rival Georgia and a handful of giveaways to get out of Exactech Arena/O'Connell Center with a much-needed 70-63 victory. "That would have been really tough to have to deal with [Sunday] at practice. It's always better to learn from a win than a loss. We we were fortunate to hang on."

Junior forward Colin Castleton, working his way back from the program's length COVID-19 pause, came off the bench to hit all five of his field-goal attempts in leading the Gators (11-5, 7-5) in a balanced scoring column with 14 points and seven rebounds. Fourth-year junior guard Tyree Appleby had 13 points and atoned for his five turnovers by hitting four clutch free throws over the final 1:25 after the Bulldogs (13-9, 6-9), who got a career-high 27 points from 5-foot-10 point guard Sahvir Wheeler, erased a 17-point second-half deficit. In fact, the UF lead was still 15 with just over three minutes to go. 

Good thing, too. 

"It wasn't really a pretty close-out," junior shooting guard Noah Locke said. "But a win is a win."

Certainly better than a loss, as the Gators moved into sole possession of fourth place in the Southeastern Conference standings. But UF's inability to finish games, no doubt, is showing up in opponents' scouting reports. Against UGA, the Gators turned the ball over an alarming eight times in the final seven minutes, with three of those turnovers becoming instant run-out buckets that took next to no time off the clock.  Again, the Florida lead was still 15 points after Castleton hit a couple free throws out of the under-4 timeout with 3:57 showing. Then Bulldogs backup guard K.D. Johnson started a run of seven straight points with a 3-pointer, the last two coming when Appleby tried to dribble out of a double-team, lost control, hit the floor and got tied up for a loose ball that went to the Bulldogs. 

UF sophomore guard Scottie Lewis stopped the run with a driving layup, his only field goal of the game, to put the lead back to 10. But then came back-to-back UGA field goals and, again, the second coming on a live-ball turnover, this time by sophomore guard Tre Mann, that transitioned to a lay-up for Johnson, taking the Gators' edge to just six with 1:28 to go. 

Three seconds later, Appleby dropped a couple free throws, but just 12 seconds later Johnson was driving past Lewis for an easy layup, again, to make it a six-point game for what would be UGA's 39th and 40th points in the paint.  

Florida missed a late-clock 3-attempt at its end, with Georgia doing the same at the other end. The long rebound became a tussle between Mann and forward P.J. Horne, with Mann getting the ball, then taking an elbow to the chin. Officials, though, called Mann for a "cylinder" violation foul that sent Horne to the free-throw line with a chance to cut the lead to four with 27.6 seconds left. 

Horne made one of two, while Appleby, fouled on the in-bound, knocked down both at the other end with 27 seconds left for a seven-point cushion. Appleby, who went 7-for-8 from the line, helped the Gators to a 20-for-25 free-throw showing (80 percent) vs. 11-for-16 for the Bulldogs (68.8 percent). 

On what turned out to be Georgia's final possession, Castleton swatted away Johnson's driving layup attempt, his third block of the game, and that was that.   "Do I think we played great down the stretch? Absolutely not. Georgia, on the other hand, was great in transition off makes and misses, and with those guys, in this league, no lead is safe," White said of a speedy Bulldogs squad — ranked 16th nationally in pace of play, according to KenPom.com advanced metrics — that erased a 13-point deficit to upset No. 20 Missouri four days earlier. "But 20 turnovers? We're a better ball-handling team than that."

Until they are, though, they aren't. In Tuesday's loss at Arkansas, the Gators turned it over 16 times. That's 36 giveaways the last two games. 

"Our keys to the game were taking care of the ball and getting good shots," Mann said. 

They didn't do the former and mostly did the latter, except for one problem: too few went in, especially after halftime. The Gators, who got a nice lift from reserve guard Ques Glover's 8 points on 3-for-3 shooting, knocked down 48 percent in the first half, including 5-for-10 from the 3-point line to lead 37-23 at the break. Shooting guard Noah Locke made a trio of treys, his last at the halftime buzzer, and doing so became just the ninth player in program history to hit at least 200 during his career. The Bulldogs, meanwhile, shot just 32.3 percent, missing 20 of their first 25 field-goal tries, and went 1-for-12 from the 3-point line for the period. 

CHARTING THE GATORS 
Noah Locke hit three 3-pointers Saturday to become just the ninth player in program history to reach 200 for a career. Here's the company Locke is now keeping. 

Career 3-pointers	Player	Years
333	Kenny Boynton	2009-13
288	Lee Humphrey	2003-07
285	Erving Walker	2008-12
274	Brett Nelson	1999-2003
267	Anthony Roberson	2002-05
250	KeVaughn Allen	2015-19
243	Greg Stolt	1995-99
227	Michael Frazier II	2012-15
201	Noah Locke	2018-present

In the second half, the script flipped. UF shot just shy of 42 percent, but went 1-for-13 from distance, missing some wide-open ones that could have made the last few minutes a little less dramatic. 

Then again, protecting the ball better would have, also. 

"I thought we looked like a good team for about 30 minutes," White said. 

The Gators, once again, will spend the next few days focusing on those other all-important 10 minutes.