With Florida trailing 53-49 and just more than two minutes to play, senior guard Lanita Bartley stole the ball from Georgia’s Jasmine Johnson and started up the floor.
Bartley sent the ball to senior guard Jordan Jones, who passed to junior forward Jennifer George in the paint.
George took a hop step but forgot to dribble, turning the ball over with 2:03 remaining.
The late traveling call was one of multiple missed opportunities for the Gators (11-6, 1-3 Southeastern Conference) in a 61-55 loss to the No. 19 Bulldogs (14-3, 3-1 SEC) Thursday.
“I’m just — as I know our team is — really frustrated with playing such tremendous second halves, but having to overcome so much because we play so poorly in the first half,” coach Amanda Butler said.
The slow start, Florida’s most glaring error, stemmed from shooting woes that had the Gators playing catch-up from the get-go.
Florida went into halftime trailing 29-16, failing to reach 20 points before the break for a second consecutive game.
“We can’t have those slow starts, especially in the SEC,” said senior guard Deana Allen, who scored 13 of her 14 points in the second half. “You’re not guaranteed to bounce back from that, even though you pick things up in the second half.”
Cold shooting from beyond the arc is primarily to blame for Florida’s meager offensive output in the first half.
The Gators were just 1 of 12 on 3-point attempts heading into the locker room, including four missed tries by Jones, who leads UF with a 34.8 3-point percentage.
Sophomore guard Jaterra Bonds made the Gators’ first 3-pointer of the night at the 16:12 mark, but Florida’s next 13 tries from beyond the arc were off.
Twenty-five minutes passed before Allen ended the drought, finding the bottom of the basket for three points with 11:12 left to play.
“We’ve just got to understand what teams are trying to make us do,” Allen said. “[Georgia] started taking away our penetration.”
An inability to score consistently also negated the Gators’ success in the battle on the boards.
Florida outrebounded Georgia 38-30, including a 22-6 advantage on the offensive glass.
However, the Gators managed only eight second-chance points, which tied the Bulldogs’ total on 16 fewer opportunities.
“That’s what we feed off of, that’s where we get our energy from when we’re crashing the boards and we’ve been dominant,” Allen said. “But we also have to be tough and able to reward ourselves for just banging like that in the paint and getting those second-chance shots.”
George and Bartley led UF’s rebound effort, grabbing a game-high eight rebounds each.
George, who led UF with 15 points, fell two rebounds short of extending her consecutive double-double streak to nine games.
Much like last Sunday’s 49-44 loss to South Carolina, Florida made its move in the second half.
Facing a 14-point deficit, the Gators went on a 13-2 run to make the score 40-37 in favor of the Bulldogs with 9:26 left in regulation.
Georgia then stymied the rally, outscoring Florida 11-4 over the next 5:02 and rendering the Gators’ last-ditch comeback effort too little, too late.
“We’ve got to get a better start,” Butler said. “We’ve got to score in the first half. We can’t beat good teams in the SEC scoring 16 points in the first 20 minutes.”
Contact Joe Morgan at joemorgan@alligator.org.
Florida guard Deana Allen scored 13 of her 14 points in the second half Thursday, but it wasn’t enough to propel the Gators to a comeback against the No. 19 Bulldogs.
