GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Before point guard Tyree Appleby could celebrate his greatest performance in a Florida uniform and the wildest crowd to invade Exactech Arena in years could celebrate one of the program's biggest victories in years — and actually storm Billy Donovan Court — here's what the UF fans (and coaches) had to endure over a final dental-chair-like 109 seconds of the Gators' insane/intense 63-62 upset Saturday afternoon of second-ranked Auburn.
Try to follow along.
* Up by eight with less than two minutes to go, the Gators forced the Tigers into a missed shot, but couldn't gather the long rebound. Auburn guard K.D. Johnson got it, was fouled and made two free throws. Six-point lead with 1:49 to play.
* After teammate Phlandrous Fleming Jr. made one of two free throws at the UF offensive end, forward Anthony Duruji fouled Auburn phenom freshman forward Jabari Smith on a 3-point shot. He dropped all three from the line. Four-point game with 1:30 left.
* Immediately after Smith's free throws, and facing the Tigers' full-court pressure, UF's Brandon McKissic tried to airmail the inbound pass from the baseline over the Auburn defense toward teammate Colin Castleton in the front court. The pass was a good 10 feet short. Johnson intercepted and drove to an easy layup. The play took four seconds. Two-point game with 1:26 remaining.
A 7-1 run in just 23 seconds. Got it?
* Auburn fouled Castleton with 1:18 to go. He made one of two. Then the two teams swapped missed shots, with Johnson getting fouled with 23 seconds remaining. He made both to make it a one-point game.
* Thirteen seconds later, UF called a timeout when point guard Tyree Appleby was surrounded on his baseline after picking up his dribble. Out of the stoppage, Fleming tried to lob an inbound pass into Castleton in front of the Florida bench. The pass was stolen. Auburn ball, Tigers down one, with 7.5 seconds to go.
Officials called a timeout to review the play, but UF coach Mike White told his players they weren't getting possession. That wasn't all he told them, as their long faces and poor body language were troubling.
"Those last couple minutes, they're OVER with! There's nothing we can do," White shouted. "We have to get a stop!"
And it was really that simple.
What White saw over the next seven-plus seconds was incredibly strong and inspiring body language from his defenders, coupled with a shaky final possession by the Tigers. They used 7-foot-1 Walker Kessler to set a high-ball screen on Appleby, who was matched against point guard Wendell Green Jr., one of the quickest drivers in the SEC. Appleby stayed engaged with the ball-handler as Castleton and Fleming rushed to the spot. Appleby, Castleton and Fleming walled up on Green, who took a few dribbles before trying to force a wrap-around pass to Kessler cutting toward the basket. Fleming, though, dropped to guard Kessler, tipped the ball away and into the hands of McKissic as time expired and the Rowdy Reptiles — in an altogether unfamiliar scene (not to mention $25,000 fine by the SEC) — emptied onto the floor.
Colin Castletonharasses and blocks the vision of Auburn guard Wendell Green Jr. (1) on the game's final play.
"It happened so fast," Castleton said. "I saw Wendell Green just coming 100 miles an hour downhill. I'm not going to let him get that much leverage on me. Most guys would just back up, but I had to stay up there because I knew my teammates had my back behind me."
They did. A couple of 'em, actually. And in more ways than one.
"We made a bunch of mistakes, but they made mistakes too," McKissic said. "We kept playing, kept playing hard, and we earned this."
The Gators (17-10, 7-7), in snapping a two-game losing streak, earned something no team in UF basketball history can claim. The Tigers (24-3, 12-2), who lost for the first time in regulation this season, became the highest-ranked opponent ever defeated by a Florida team at home. The Gators began the day 0-11 all-time at home against teams ranked either No. 1 or No. 2.
"We didn't finish it strong, we just didn't," White said. "But what an incredible, physical, intensity-level effort for 40 minutes."
Speaking of incredible, Appleby scored 20 of his UF career-high 26 points in the second half to lead the comeback. He got a lot of help from Castleton (19 points, 8 rebounds) and a defense that held one of the nation's best offenses to 40-percent shooting for the game, 5-for-14 from the 3-point line, 18 points below its season average and forced 17 turnovers, much to the delight of the first sellout crowd to grace the O'Dome in two years.
UF point guard Tyree Appleby(22) drives buy Auburn's Dylan Cardwell (44) for two of his 20 second-half points Saturday.
"Florida forced us not to play well," Auburn coach Bruce Pearl said after his program's 14th straight loss in Gainesville (the last five on his watch), dating to the 1998 season. "And a lot of that had to do with the crowd."
It was lit from the tip, with plenty of Tigers fans in the house, also. The Gators, despite shooting just 26 percent, outplayed the Tigers for most of the first half and led by eight when Myreon Jones dropped a 3 at the four-minute mark. To that point, Auburn was at 25 percent for the game, but woke up to score the final seven points of the period to trail by one, 22-21, at the break.
The Tigers brought that momentum out of the locker room, with Smith scoring 10 of his game-high 28 points, during a 14-4 spree to start the period — or a 21-4 run bridging the halves — and take a nine-point lead, 35-26, with 15 minutes to go.
"We kept telling ourselves in the huddle there was going to be some adversity," Appleby said. "They were going to go on a run and we were going to go on a run."
The Florida run finally came. More like an Appleby run.
He scored seven points of a 10-2 rush, capped by a 3 from Fleming that gave the Gators their first lead since late first half. Auburn tied the tame with Smith free throws, but then came another UF 8-2 push with loud 3s from Appleby and McKissic. Kessler's dunk made it a one-point game, 56-55, but then Castleton posted Kessler for a bucket and, then after a forced turnover, Appleby pulled up from the wing in transition and buried a 3 — the fourth consecutive made field goal for the Gators — with 2:14 left and 61-53 lead.
"It felt good just seeing the ball just doing down the hole," said Appleby, who hit six of his nine shots after halftime, including four of six 3-point attempts and all four of his free throws. "My teammates keep feeding me. We were getting stops. In the moment, it felt great."
Then the pressure-packed moments and miscues commenced.
For the Gators, the final minute and half looked all too familiar to the last 90 seconds Tuesday night at Texas A&M, where they blew a four-point lead on the road by allowing the Aggies to score the final five points; even fouling a 3-point shooter to assist in the decisive points.
UF had the last four days to angst over that one, and then there the Gators were again, having to wipe that one from their collective heads, as well as the disastrous 90 seconds that had just played out before them.
"You're going to get low, we're human," White said afterward. "Our guys were as dejected in the locker room in College Station [Texas] the other night as I've ever seen them in probably any locker room in a couple, if not a few, years in a regular season game," White said. "But then you've got to bounce back. You've got to bounce back quickly."
Tyree Appleby gets the post-game water treatment from Keyontae Johnson, much to the delight of the victorious UF locker room.
They did enough wrong to lose the game. Then did enough right to win it. A really big one, too.
Worthy of a court-storm, apparently.
"They were incredible," White said of the fans. "Happy for them that they got to have that moment post-game."
Bet the moments in the home locker room were pretty good, too.
