Florida is out for redemption against Missouri.
Last season, the Tigers eked out a 69-64 victory against the Gators in Columbia, Mo.
At the time, Missouri was third in the nation in three-pointers made.
Heading into the O’Connell Center tonight, the Tigers are fourth in the NCAA, averaging 9.4 threes per contest — about 28 points per game.
“Missouri’s played fantastic and beat a very talented Auburn team at Auburn,” coach Amanda Butler said. “They’re playing well; shooting the ball better than anybody in our league.”
Butler is wary that such a strong three-point effort could potentially throw a wrench into a game plan.
“The thing that I’m concerned with is that it will put us in a mindset to shoot more threes,” she said. “That was what I felt like happened to Auburn in their last ballgame, in which (Missouri) was up 42-14. A team like Auburn doesn’t typically shoot a ton of threes. All of a sudden they got into that groove of shooting shots they don’t normally take.”
Auburn is 13th in the Southeastern Conference in three-point shots made per game — averaging only 2.8 — and is dead last in the conference in three-point percentage, shooting 26 percent.
Against Missouri, Florida went 3 for 18 from beyond the arc.
“I think it puts you in a mindset where you’ve got to be contesting, because they don’t just shoot a lot of them, they hit a lot of them,” Butler said of Missouri. “As a rebounding unit, it puts you in a different spot, too. You’re going to have a lot more longer rebounds.”
For sophomore January Miller, facing a team that gives up long rebounds is just what the doctor ordered.
“That’s something I’ve been working on, just trying to read where the ball’s going,” Miller said. “More long rebounds makes it easier for you to get out in transition.”
“It gives more of a chance for our guards to go and rebound; puts less pressure on the post.”
Coming off a less than desirable performance against Georgia on Sunday, Miller is poised to redeem herself against Missouri. Against the Bulldogs, she scored five points, turned the ball over three times and fouled out.
A major aspect that Butler has preached since the recent losses to both Georgia and Arkansas has been better ball management.
“They imposed their defensive style on us in very different ways,” Butler said. “Arkansas pretty much sat in a zone and they had one player that really got out in the passing lanes and we never really adjusted to her. Georgia was a little more aggressive, a little bit more trying to make plays.”
With tonight’s game being Florida’s penultimate home game this season, the Gators are still maintaining a simple approach to the rest of their season.
“Well, we’ve got to win,” Butler said. “You have to win each possession; you’ve got to win each half. In our game, it’s kind of broken down into four-minute segments because of the media timeouts. So you’ve got to try to win each four-minute segment of every ballgame.”
Follow Gordon Streisand on Twitter @GordonStreisand
January Miller drives the ball to the net during Florida’s 87-69 win against Auburn on Jan. 26 in the O’Connell Center. Miller scored only five points while turning the ball over three times in UF’s loss to UGA on Sunday.
