Three Takeaways from Florida vs. Marshall

Florida basketball beat Marshall 73-67 on Friday night. Here are some notes.

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Despite a less than ideal start, and that’s putting it lightly, the Gators got it done in their first game since winning the Charleston Classic, beating the Marshall Thundering Herd by a score of 72-67 last night in the O-Dome.

Here are three takeaways from the contest.

Scottie Lewis is an NBA defender

This was Lewis’s third game this season with three blocks, including one Lebron-Andre Iguodala style run down late in the game to keep it a two-score game. 

His speed and ridiculous bounce contribute to the 14 blocks he has on the year already. Perhaps more importantly though, his offensive game is starting to catch up. Come March, he could be special. 

Ques Glover can be Chris Chiozza

We remember Chiozza as a starting senior point guard his final year, but what about his first three seasons? 

He fought through multiple guards his freshman year to get on the floor and was the definite backup point guard his sophomore and junior seasons. 

Glover, like Chiozza, bring shooting, touch, speed and energy. He is such a change of pace from Nembhard, and can often grease the wheels of a slow-moving offense. 

The second half finally showed a team with fight

The first half was rough for the Gators. Through the first twenty minutes of action, they only had 25 points to show for the game and were more importantly down eight.  

Marshall is a terrible 2-4 basketball team and UF should’ve beaten them by much more than six points. But the second half was dominant. 

A slow scoring half of 25 in the first was entirely different in the second. Florida dropped 48 in the latter twenty minutes of the game and won the second half by 14. 

The shooting was better. The execution was cleaner. The effort was harder.

Mike White’s team looked a little bit pissed off in the second half. It looked like the Gators had a little bit of fire under their feet and played much more excited basketball. 

To me, this was the issue a few weeks ago. 

This team just looked apathetic in games like Florida State and UCONN. It looked like it was still in preseason, playing non-desperate defense and non-explosive offense. 

It appears that that narrative is changing. Is that because of Ques Glover? Scottie Lewis? Kerry Blackshear Jr.? 

The real answer is probably that it’s a mixture of many players, but Glover and Lewis have to be the top two. Who would’ve thought a team full of veteran leadership would be getting its spark from true freshman? 

But whatever works, Mike White, do it.