Florida basketball dropped the first game played in its new and revamped form to the Baylor Bears in Jacksonville on Sunday afternoon, 82-76, in overtime. Fortunately, it was just a preseason exhibition matchup that was intended to give the Gators some fine-tuning ahead of the upcoming campaign.
It was a tightly contested game that saw 11 ties and lead changes over 45 minutes of play, but Florida's gross inefficiency on offense gave Baylor every opportunity in the world to pull off the win. The Gators finished with a 25-for-72 (34.7%) overall effort from the floor — including a 4-for-29 (13.8%) mark from 3-point range — along with a 22-for-35 (62.9%) showing from the free-throw line.
Thomas Haugh led Florida with 19 points on 4-for-13 shooting overall while making nine of his 10 free-throw attempts; he also added five rebounds, two steals, an assist and a block before fouling out in OT with 26 seconds remaining.
After the game, head coach Todd Golden, along with Haugh, spoke to the media about the program's preseason loss. Here is what they had to offer.
Todd Golden's opening statement
I think there's a reason why you play these exhibitions. Get an opportunity to try to figure some things out, learn from, uh, your mistakes, learn from what you do well. Process-wise today, I think we did some good things. You know, we want to obviously take more shots than our opponents. We took 17 more field goals than Baylor did. Took three more free throws than Baylor did. Generally, that's a good recipe for success.
Obviously, we didn't take advantage today. I thought defensively, we made them miss enough. I think we held under 50% from two and made some timely threes, and I thought defensively we defended without fouling poorly — too many times late in a possession or late in the paint. We didn't stay down, stay between, and let them get to the line where they hurt us.
Offensively, I just didn't think we were able really able to ever find a rhythm. I thought there were multiple opportunities in the 1st half. You know, where we went on a little run where we had some good looks from three, to maybe get a little separation, get them on their heels a little bit. But 1-for-13 from three in the first half on what we thought were about 10 uncontested looks — nine or 10.
After kind of evaluating as a staff — so we left a lot of points on the board that way. And then I thought that we started pressing a little bit. We allowed those misses to affect us in the other parts of the game that don't require talent.
Again, you know, obviously I'd much rather be up here talking about a big victory against Baylor, where we're able to gain a little confidence and see what worked, but my hope is that we can use this as an opportunity to grow with a couple more weeks before the regular season.
A loss like this gives you a bad taste in your mouth; how much can you use an exhibition to motivate?
GOLDEN: I would prefer to teach after a win than a loss always, but I think there's gonna be great opportunity to address a few issues. After today's game, does it change our mentality moving forward? Probably a little bit, with 2.5 weeks until the regular season starts.
I think you can learn a lot from these games; that's why we wanted to play a really good opponent like Baylo, to kind of see how we look against somebody else. When you practice against your own team for 4 weeks, you kind of get used to certain things and it's good to see (other) teams.
They have some great athleticism and quickness and do things differently — which they did and I thought they bothered us a little bit.
How do you evaluate the bench production today?
GOLDEN: I didn't think they played well enough. We went 1-for-14 from the floor from the bench. That's never going to be good enough. I think, and not just for the bench, I think, for the whole team. I think our effort was in the right place in terms of what we wanted to try to do. I think are — we're an unselfish team. We play hard. We try to play the right way, but we gotta make shots too. That's a big part of this game, and those guys, specifically (Urban Klavžar).
He had an off night by his standards; he had really good looks and he just wasn't able to capitalize. And we need more out of Isaiah (Brown). I think he was a guy that played really well for us last year for a large portion of the season and he was not himself for his best today. And as I told the team, we got to look at some other guys too that didn't get an opportunity today that have been playing pretty well in practice.
It's just a reminder that you guys are gonna get everyone's best shot this season; kind of a wake-up call
HAUGH: I think we knew that coming into this game — at least I did — and I knew every team was going to be excited when they play the Gators this year, but we just didn't play well enough today — like at all.
On Baylor's defense, double teaming down low
GOLDEN: Yeah, they did a good job keeping it out of there. You know, I'll watch it and see — I don't think their double teams bothered us a whole lot, to be honest. I thought that when they did, when we were able to get it inside, whether it was to Reuben (Chinyelu) or (Alex) Condo(n), when they did bring the baseline double, it actually opened up the weak side of the floor and they did a pretty good job for a majority of the game of getting it up and out to an open shooter.
I thought we needed to be more aggressive trying to get it in there. And that starts with me: I need to do a better job calling plays and/or organizing us so we can get a low post catch because Reuben and Condo have both proven the ability to handle a double team and get ourselves an advantage or disadvantage out of those situations.
So, I think our biggest, bigger issue is getting it in there. We allowed a three-quarter front and some undersized guys fronting bothered us in terms of getting the ball inside. Once we got a catch, I thought we played pretty effectively in terms of our process offensively.
Talk about Denzel and what we saw from him
GOLDEN: We're thrilled he's back. He's had a really good fall, played really well. I thought he was not good today. I think he needs to be better: he was 3-for-17; he didn't make a three, took 10 of them. And I thought defensively, he was good, not great. So, first game back, I'm sure there were a lot of emotions for him and just trying to get back comfortable. And he'll play better before.
On CJ Ingram's health, absence
GOLDEN: He needs to get healthy. So there's not much that he can provide if he's not playing.
On Thomas Haugh being more vocal
HAUGH: I think that's something I need to do better this year, especially, is use my voice more. I'm not really crazy-vocal on the on the court, off the court, and I think Coach Golden to an extent — you know, you can't get to us like the players and I think I need to use my voice more. I didn't do that today well enough at all.
Do you have any foul trouble concerns?
GOLDEN: Not a ton. You know, I think that's any team, you know, that plays doesn't want, you know, their front quarter, their guys to get in foul trouble, but, you know, it's not something that I'm very concerned about moving forward with the season.
Rueben's gonna be a guy that — some games — picks up some fouls. He plays very aggressive defensively. I thought he did a good job in the second half, limiting those opportunities. So it's not — at this point, at least — it's not a big concern of mine moving forward.
What would you like to see?
GOLDEN: To be as honest as I can be, it's a different challenge for us against them. I think Baylor is obviously a more athletic, bigger, stronger team. And some of that bothered us today. So, again, Stetson — the things that we talk about a lot are taking care of the ball. We only had eight turnovers today in 45 minutes — I'm always going to be happy with that.
The first-half rebounding effort I was pleased with; I think we're up plus-10 on the glass in the first half. Obviously, the last 25 minutes were really, really poor on the glass. Being minus-5 against a team that's playing a little undersized is an issue that we got to address.
Again, we got to play better. Some things got to show up in those sets in-game, but I think our bigger tests will be against Miami opening night — to see how we perform against a team like that.
On Boogie Fland's performance the backcourt
GOLDEN: I thought we played a pretty good floor game. There's only like one questionable decision offensively off the top of my head that I can point to. I thought he did a good job for the most part. I think defensively — he had high defensive usage today, if that makes sense. He's guarding the ball, the top, the middle of the floor, and those guys are trying to make plays every possession.
So I know (Kaylen) Mingo got us a little bit. I'm not sure how much of that was on him — as opposed to some of the some of the other guys — but I think he played well. He's been playing really well. I think he's going to be have a really good season for us.
Was Golden okay with the pace?
HAUGH: That we were playing with? No, our team, I think, strives a lot this year and getting down in transition and pushing the ball — like getting into quick screens and today, we were walking the ball up, and it wasn't how we were going to play.
Was it the players' fault?
HAUGH: Yeah. It was us.
How do you want to see that half-court offense improve when you're not pushing the pace?
GOLDEN: I think we got some really good shots. Again, it's a process type thing. We'll go back. We got to handle switching a little bit better, but again, I thought there were a lot of opportunities that we were able to create in half court.
We got to the line a ton. We shot 35 free throws. We didn't shoot them very efficiently, but again, process over result. We'll see how it goes. We'll watch the film a little bit, but we got a lot of open threes. We got to the line a lot. You know, we'll live with that.
Was the offense operating like he wanted it to?
GOLDEN: No, I thought it was a little stagnant. I thought we were pounding a little too much, and we were unable to get side to side, which is something that we do really well.
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This article originally appeared on Gators Wire: Golden, Haugh discuss Florida's preseason overtime loss to Baylor