NASHVILLE — The Gators came into Nashville, Tenn., knowing the senior-laden Commodores were starving for an emotional lift in their final home game of the season.
It had been nearly two years since any of Vanderbilt’s six seniors tasted success against Florida, their most recent attempt an eight-point defeat in early February.
Just two minutes after the tip at Memorial Gym, the Commodores had already expressed their urgency on the court.
Three Vanderbilt seniors — Jeffery Taylor, Festus Ezeli and Lance Goulbourne — scored the first seven points of the game and helped hold Florida without a bucket for the opening 2:50. Almost eight minutes later, the Commodores’ advantage had swollen to 14-5.
“They’re going to make runs,” UF freshman Brad Beal said. “Coach (Billy) Donovan said that. You just have to stay composed, because they’re going to have their runs. But we’re going to have our runs as well like we did.”
While No. 16 Florida (22-8, 10-5 Southeastern Conference) received an inspired effort from its lone senior, Erving Walker, it could not overcome an equally impressive 50-percent shooting night from three by the Commodores (21-9, 10-5 SEC), who claimed a 77-67 victory Tuesday night.
Vanderbilt shot a torrid 12 of 24 pace from behind the arc, and junior John Jenkins, the SEC’s leading scorer, finished with a game-high 22 points on 6-for-9 shooting on 3-pointers.
“It’s never good to get down early but we battled and we got back into the game,” Walker said. “They just made some good plays at the end.”
Five days before his own Senior Night against Kentucky this Sunday, Walker sparked an 8-0 run in the final minutes of the opening half with a four-point play and two layups. The scoring streak brought the Gators within three points at halftime after they had trailed by as many as 12.
Though Walker’s 15 points weren’t a team-high, Florida’s leading scorer, Brad Beal with 16 points, credited him for getting the Gators back into the game.
“Once he started doing that, it really gave us a lift,” Beal said. “We needed that and Erv really stepped up and he did a good job at penetrating to the hole.”
After Walker’s run, UF kept pace before grabbing its first lead of the game at the 10:32 mark on a fast-break dunk by sophomore Casey Prather.
Donovan said he was impressed with his team, especially following its 14-point loss last Saturday to lowly Georgia. After the UGA game, Donovan called out UF for missing leadership, citing poor energy level and a lack of passion.
His tone was noticeably different Tuesday at Vanderbilt, even with the loss and another missed chance for Florida to seal the No. 2 seed in the SEC Tournament on March 8-11.
“I felt like they had resiliency [Tuesday]; I felt they were going to battle and work their way back into the game,” Donovan said. “That’s been my whole thing with Erving. All along and all the comments I’ve made about Erving, when he’s locked in and he’s really, really focused and playing, it charges our team up.”
While the Gators were manhandled and outhustled at times by the Bulldogs, who had eight steals and six blocks against Florida, the Commodores were not able to find the same success, defensively.
“I was maybe as disappointed as I was as a coach walking off the floor in Athens, Georgia, watching our team perform,” Donovan said. “I felt totally opposite here [Tuesday]. I thought we competed. We played hard against a very, very good team.”
Contact John Boothe at jboothe@alligator.org.
After complaining about effort following a loss to UGA, coach Billy Donovan said he was impressed with UF’s resiliency in Tuesday’s 77-67 loss at Vanderbilt.
