UF Escapes Furious Georgia Rally With OT Win - Florida Gators (2024)

Maddie Washburn

• Box Score

Game Recap: Men's Basketball | Saturday, January 27, 2024 | Chris Harry, Senior Writer

GAINESVILLE, Fla.– There's a fine line between college basketball heartache and heartbreak, and the Florida Gators almost tripped over it Saturday.

Key word there:almost.

Grad-transfer point guard Zyon Pullin, his team clinging to a two-point lead in overtime, sank two free throws with 5.7 seconds left and the Gators held on for a 102-98 victory over Southeastern Conference rival Georgia – and former Coach Mike White – after blowing a 21-point second-half lead by turning both cold and generous on the offensive end.

Pullin scored seven points in the extra period, with his free throws coming after the Bulldogs, trailing by seven with 13 seconds to go, scored five points in less than six seconds to close the margin to two. Pullin, 84.3 percent from the line on the season and 7-for-8 for the game, knocked them down for a two-possession lead and a third straight victory for the Gators (14-6, 4-3), who have bounced back from losing their first two conference games of the season.

"A win's a win," UF coach Todd Golden said. "The great thing is we can learn from it positively and not have a tough weekend thinking about a brutal loss. That's part of growing as a program."

Florida 7-foot-1 center Micah Handlogten led the Gators with career highs of 23 points and 17 rebounds, the most boards by a UF player since Alex Tyus cleared that manyin a 2011 NCAA Tournament game. Handlogten made 10 of his 13 shots, even banked in a 3-pointer, and had seven offensive rebounds to pace his team's 48-27 onslaught on the glass.

Pullin, the fifth-year by way of California-Riverside, was 6-for-9 from the floor, made his only 3-point attempt, grabbed seven rebounds, dished eight assists and turned the ball over just once in engineering a UF offense that shot 54.9 percent for the game, 7-for-20 from distance (35.0) and made 17 of 20 free throws (85.0 percent), in addition to the overwhelming rebounding advantage.

But while Pullin was exceptional with his ball-security, his teammates were not. Georgia forced 19 turnovers (UF had combined for 15 the previous two games), including 10 in the second period when the Bulldogs trailed four times by 21 points, the last time after reserve UF freshman forward Alex Condon threw in a post-up jump-hook at the 12:50 mark to push his team in front 68-49.

"Winning is hard to do so we're happy about the win," said UF junior guard Will Richard, who had 18 points and seven rebounds, but was 1-for-7 from deep and turned the ball over four times. "We know there's a lot we can improveon to not give up a 21-point lead."

The Florida lead was still 14, at 81-67, with just over five minutes to go when Georgia commenced its remarkable run. It started with a 3-pointer by Melendez, the Illinois transfer who came into the game averaging 9.8 points and shooting 22.6 percent from distance. He exited with a career-high 35 points and dropped six of 10 from the arc.

The Gators were up 85-75 after a layup by guard Walter Clayton Jr. (18 points, 4-for-8 from 3), but another Melendez 3 at the 2:40 mark started the Bulldogs' run of 10 straight points to finish regulation, with freshman guard Blue Cain (14 points) hitting two free throws at 2:02, then a 3-pointer after a Florida shot-clock violation turnover, then a driving layup with 49.4 seconds to go for seven straight points.

Both teams had chances to win the game in the final seconds of the period. UF's first chance ended with a Richard turnover in traffic under the basket with 26 seconds to go. Richard, though, atoned by stripping Georgia's Justin Hill in the halfcourt. Richard dribbled into the frontcourt and his desperation 3-pointer at the horn bounced off the back of the rim.

The timeout between regulation and overtime gave both teams a chance to reset, but all the momentum was with the Bulldogs, who earlier this season came from 17 down on the road to beat Florida State. They shot 62 percent in the second period (21 of 34), with five 3s, and scored 51 points.

"It was obviously a gut punch to see triple-zeroes across the clock and be tied knowing that we have to go to overtime," said Golden, whose team never trailed in the game and held the lead for nearly 43of the 45 minutes. "The message was, 'Hey, we can respond one of two ways in the situation: We can either feel sorry for ourselves and think we blew it and just kind of not regain that focus and regain that fight. Or we can buck up and get back to playing basketball.' "

Added Pullin: "We stayed poised, that was the biggest thing. We knew what we needed to correct and the biggest thing was just staying together to start overtime."

UF's first possession was a turnover, but UGA's was a miss that Pullin turned into a fast-breaking, downhill, old-fashioned 3-pointer and early lead. A permanent lead, as it turned out.

The two teams traded buckets, with 7-foot, 270-pound Russel Tchewa (15 points, 11 rebounds) throwing in a layup at the 3:30 mark to pull the Dogs within 90-89.

But then Clayton attacked the baseline and fed Richard for a layup. At UGA's end, Cain missed a 3-pointer and the Gators finished their next possession with a jumper in the paint from Pullin with 2:40 remaining. Georgia's next two possessions, sandwiched around a miss at UF's side, ended with a shot-clock violation and errant 3-ball, the second at the 1:30 mark and the Gators still up five.

Then came a stick-back bucket by Richard (with a flex for the fans) for a seven-point edge inside a minute to go. That's where things stood when Condon hit two free throws with 22.7 to go to make it 100-93. Over, right?

Wrong.

A driving layup by guard Noah Thomasson was followed by a turnover when Clayton tried to throw over the Bulldogs' full-court press with a long throw up the floor. The ball was picked off by Melendez, who dribbled into the halfcourt and buried his sixth 3 of the game to make it a two-point game with 6.5 seconds to go.

"Our fight there in the last 10-15 minutes of the game was high, high level," said White, who fell to 0-3 against his former team. "It gave us a chance."

But it ended with Pullin at the line for the close. UF, which was last last in the SEC in free-throw shooting heading into league play at 65.7 percent, went 7-for-7 from the line in overtime.

"You don't get up by 19 and 21 [points] in these two games at home against some good teams if you're not improving from where we were a month ago," said Golden, whose team Wednesday night led Mississippi State by 17 in the second half, but let those Bulldogs get back in the game late, too. "I think the next step for our group is just pushing through and playing the full 40, regardless of the score, regardless of the situation, just staying true to what we want to do in terms of our execution, in terms of taking care of the ball. I didn't think we did that the last 10 minutes."

They did enough in the extra five, though, which surely beat the alternative.