The Florida Gators took down the Oregon State Beavers, 81-68, on Friday night to advance to the fifth-place game of the Phil Knight Legacy Tournament.
UF got out to a very hot start in this one and never really looked back. Florida spent just 37 seconds of this ame without the lead, and most of the time it was a double digit lead. Colin Castleton didn’t have a monster night thanks to four fouls, but he looked a lot better than he did against Xavier and proved that not every 7-footer is going to shut him down. There’s still plenty of time for him to prove that he’s one of the nation’s top big men, but his draft stock is about where it was at the end of last season despite a great start to the year.
On the other hand, guard Trey Bonham as lit up the scoreboard in each of his two starts during this tournament. He figures to be a major part of the starting lineup moving forward, even if it means cutting into Kowacie Reeves’ playing time. Bonham led all scorers with 19 points, and Will Richard was lights out with 13 points on 4-of-5 shooting.
Although it was a nice bounce-back win, Florida still has to prove itself against a non-Quadrant 4 opponent to earn some respect this year. That likely won’t happen in the fifth-place game of this tournament, but conference play might present the opportunity.
The Gators came out of the gates hot
Florida clearly wasn’t happy with the first-round loss to Xavier on Thanksgiving, so the Gators made it up with a 22-4 run through the first 8:39 against Oregon State. Although the Beavers went on a bit of a run at the end of the first half to cut the deficit to 13 points, Florida led by as much as 23 through the first 20 minutes.
Losing to Xavier wasn’t ideal, and surely won’t help Florida garner any support in the polls, but this is about as good of a bounce back as a team can have. Still, beating the Beavers is only good for a Quadrant 4 victory, which won’t help UF come Selection Sunday.
Trey Bonham is the truth!
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Troy Wayrynen-USA TODAY Sports
Trey Bonham was lights out for Florida in this one and led all scorers with 19 points. Thirteen of those came in the first half of the game on 4-of-7 shooting, including three buckets from beyond the three-point line. He cooled off a bit in the second half but still added another six points to his total. Bonham also lost his clean slate in the turnover column in the second half, but now we’re just nitpicking a solid performance.
This is the second-straight game that Bonham has led the team in scoring, and he’s proving to be a valuable piece of Todd Golden’s offense. Buy stock in him now because things are only pointing up for the Virginia Military Institute transfer.
A nice bounce back game for Colin Castleton
Troy Wayrynen-USA TODAY Sports
Colin Castleton didn’t light up the scoreboard the same way he did in the first four games of the season, but this was a much better game for him than the one against Xavier. Facing the Musketeers, Florida’s big man was limited to 11 points on 5-of-14 shooting (35.7%). Facing a 7-footer seemed to limit what Castleton was able to do, but that wasn’t the case against Oregon State.
Castleton went 3-for-3 from the field in the first half and 2-for-2 from the foul line, scoring eight points and pulling down four boards. He’d add to that total in the second half and finish with 12 points, but foul trouble slowed him down in the second half.
Fortunately, Florida didn’t need to lean on their big man too much in this one and he was able to finish the night with some solid numbers.
Felder’s foul trouble might be Fudge’s path to starting minutes
Troy Wayrynen-USA TODAY Sports
[autotag]CJ Felder[/autotag] is a good player that will have a role on this Florida team all year, barring injury. But he’s ran into foul trouble in each of the last two games for Florida after playing relatively clean ball through the first four games of the season. That wouldn’t be cause for concern normally, but [autotag]Alex Fudge[/autotag] is waiting in the wings and ready to take over Felder’s starting role whenever Todd Golden decides to make the switch.
Felder isn’t quite the scorer Fudge is, but that might actually work against the LSU transfer. Fudge entered tonight’s contest with 13 more minutes played than Felder and is a nice option off the bench with Colin Castleton doing most of the scoring down low with the starting unit. Perhaps Golden is keeping the two off the court at the same time on purpose, but Felder could force a change if he can’t stop fouling.
Two games is a small sample size though, so expect Golden to give Felder quite the long leash before making any permanent switches.
Whatever the deal is with Kowacie Reeves, Todd Golden needs to get him more minutes
[autotag]Kowacie Reeves[/autotag] wasn’t in the starting lineup once again for Florida, but it remains a mystery as to exactly why Todd Golden refuses to use a player that displays some NBA-caliber talent on the regular. The broadcasters confirmed that Reeves’ lack of playing time against Xavier wasn’t disciplinary related, which makes things even more mysterious. Add in the fact that Reeves led all Gators last year when Florida faced Xavier, and the question marks continue to grow larger.
Reeves played a team-low eight minutes (the same amount of playing time that Myreon Jones is getting) against Oregon State, but he made sure to make his presence felt once he got in the game. Just after the 12:00 mark in the second half, he drove to the baseline and delivered a reverse jam that had SportsCenter Top 10 potential. Now, one dunk doesn’t mean much in the grand scheme of things, but it sure seemed like a statement play for the multi-colored hair athlete.
Here’s hoping Reeves gets a little more playing time over the next few games and that nothing is medically limiting him from taking the court more often than he is.
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