Florida had one final chance to boost its NCAA Tournament resume against No. 10 Tennessee on Sunday.
However, the task of defeating the Volunteers in perhaps the final home game of coach Pat Summitt’s career proved too much for the Gators to overcome.
Tennessee (21-8, 12-4 Southeastern Conference) pulled away late in a 75-59 win against Florida (18-11, 8-8 SEC) in Knoxville, Tenn., dropping the Gators’ record against ranked opponents to 2-7 this season.
Despite falling to the Volunteers, coach Amanda Butler maintains that her squad is still worthy of an at-large bid to The Big Dance.
“Our NCAA Tournament chances are great,” Butler said. “The body of work, in February in particular, has been outstanding and in terms of proving that we deserve to be in that field as an at-large bid, is what we need.”
Florida went into Sunday’s game ranked 35th in RPI and 14th in strength of schedule.
Despite a missed opportunity to record a crucial quality win, senior Jordan Jones still believes the Gators will end up on the right side of the bubble come Selection Sunday.
“[Our chances] are not any different than they were last week,” Jones said. “We got beat by a great team on their home court, but that doesn’t put us out. We still have the SEC Tournament.”
Playing a significant number of close games has worked in Florida’s favor throughout the year.
The Gators are 3-9 in games decided by six points or fewer this season and Sunday’s contest seemed headed for another tight finish.
Florida trailed just 55-48 with 7:19 to play before Tennessee went on a 9-3 run to open up a double-digit lead.
UF had trouble keeping up with UT due to poor shooting from 3-point range. Jones and Lily Svete, who led Florida with 12 points, combined for a 5-of-11 effort from beyond the arc.
But the other eight players to receive time against the Volunteers were 0 of 13 from 3-point range, including a combined 0-of-9 clip from Andrea Vilaró Aragonés and Deana Allen.
“That’s something where we’ve got to grow up and mature,” Jones said. “When threes aren’t falling, we can’t continue to just jack them up the first chance we get.”
Inside the arc, Jennifer George went up against Glory Johnson in a battle between the top two rebounders in the SEC.
Despite recording her SEC-leading 14th double-double of the season with 11 points and 11 boards, George was not up to Johnson’s level. Johnson scored a game-high 21 points and grabbed 10 rebounds, creating problems for the Florida frontcourt defensively.
George and Azania Stewart finished the game with four fouls each.
“She’s hard to guard one-on-one,” Butler said. “The way she positions, it’s really hard to get around her and she gets a lot of looks and she gets a lot of things that go her way.”
With Sunday’s loss to the Volunteers, the Gators finish the regular season ranked eighth in the SEC. Florida will face ninth-place Auburn in the first round of the SEC Tournament on Thursday at 1 p.m.
The Gators defeated the Tigers 70-56 on Feb. 9 in the O’Connell Center in their only meeting this season.
“We’ve just got to get back to focusing on us and what we did wrong, particularly our defense,” Jones said.
“If you don’t show up with defense in the SEC Tournament, you’ll be going home on the first night.”
Contact Joe Morgan at joemorgan@alligator.org.
Florida forward Jennifer George (32) recorded her SEC-leading 14th double-double in Sunday’s 75-59 loss to Tennessee, but it wasn’t enough as Vols forward Glory Johnson (25) scored 21 to propel UT.
