A little more than a week ago, the Gators barely had to think about losing players to foul trouble.
Through 24 games, they had just two foulouts — the lowest amount in the Southeastern Conference — and both instances came during comfortable Florida victories. Missing neither Casey Prather in the second half against Stetson nor Patric Young late while hosting UAB hurt the Gators.
But that was when Florida was still at full strength and didn’t have to stretch its starters’ minutes to compensate for injuries to Will Yeguete (concussion) and Mike Rosario (hip pointer).
In UF’s last two games, against Tennessee and Alabama, the Gators have had three foulouts and emerged with one win and one loss.
“I think we got caught in a difficult situation there when Will went down with his injury,” Donovan said. “We probably had to play some lineups that we’re not accustomed to playing and certainly got into a real bind when Erik Murphy and Patric Young picked up two fouls (against Tennessee).”
After recording three fouls in 36 minutes against the Volunteers, it took Young just 22 minutes on Tuesday in Tuscaloosa, Ala., to exit with his fifth and final foul. Though he scored 19 points and dominated offensively above the rim, his limited minutes helped hold him to just three rebounds.
As a team, Florida was out-rebounded for the seventh time in 11 SEC games.
“Our guys’ intentions are always good,” Donovan said. “They’re always trying to step up and do some more, but I think in those kinds of situations, instead of trying to step up and do more, we have to try and rely on each other some more. We have to do that on both ends of the floor, both offensively and defensively.”
Young has gone through his own ankle injury issues in the last month, and Donovan said keeping the 6-foot-9 center fresh and not fatigued will be critical in keeping him on the court and safe from whistles.
“I’d say [Tuesday] was the best I’ve felt in a while,” Young said. “My teammates were able to find me and I was able to run the floor pretty well. The ball was just going in for me and I’m very thankful that it was.”
During last year’s 37-game Elite Eight season, the Gators were the only Division-I team to not have a single foulout. The remaining 344 squads each had at least three.
Before losing Yeguete and Rosario, Florida had a similar run going with its 15.4 fouls per game ranking third-lowest in the league.
The Gators’ last four halves of basketball, however, have been a different story with eight UF players committing 41 fouls.
Luckily for Florida, Alabama was also playing short-handed at home after coach Anthony Grant kept suspended forwards JaMychal Green and Tony Mitchell out of the Crimson Tide’s lineup.
Alabama committed 18 fouls on Tuesday — one more than Florida — which led to 16 free-throw attempts for the Gators. Guards Kenny Boynton, Brad Beal and Erving Walker combined to make 13 of Florida’s shots from the charity stripe.
“Just playing with a lot of fight,” Walker said. “Our intensity level has been low in games and we just wanted to come in and fight. We know Alabama is a good team. They’re playing without two of their best players, but they were going to come in and fight and we wanted to play harder than them.”
Contact John Boothe at jboothe@alligator.org.
After not having a foulout throughout the 2010-11 season, Florida has been racking them up as of late, totaling three in the past two games.
