Madness in college basketball isn’t exclusive to March.
Several teams in the Southeastern Conference, commonly perceived to be much improved coming off a down year, have already fallen to or narrowly escaped upset-minded underdogs early in their nonconference schedules this season.
“It’s amazing to me that in the month of March, games like that that are upsets in the NCAA Tournament get much more magnitude placed on them,” UF coach Billy Donovan said. “If people were paying attention in the month of November, they’d see it happen all the time.”
With UF (1-0) taking on Georgia Southern (1-1) tonight at 7 in the O’Connell Center, the Gators aren’t taking anything for granted.
“It just makes you more on-edge because you don’t want to be one of those schools that loses and gets knocked off,” point guard Erving Walker said. “They may be small schools, but these schools still got talent. If you don’t bring your A-game, they’ll beat you.”
Mississippi State, Alabama and Georgia got a taste of the giant killers’ potential, as they dropped their season openers to Rider, Cornell and Wofford, respectively.
It hasn’t just been SEC teams bothered by the upset bug. UCLA’s 68-65 loss to Cal State Fullerton in double-overtime ended a 37-game home winning streak against unranked nonconference opponents.
Even Kentucky — ranked No. 4 in the nation and picked to win the SEC this season — needed a last-second shot from heralded freshman John Wall on Monday night to hold off Miami (Ohio) in the Wildcats’ second game of the season.
The RedHawks kept it close due in large part to their 15-of-26 shooting from 3-point range. Donovan has stressed the importance of defending the outside shot to his players, as he considers it the equalizing factor between powerhouse programs and outmatched opponents.
“Games can get away from you a lot easier if you’re scoring twos and the other team’s scoring threes,” Walker said. “That means they’re winning.”
Despite the possibility of a huge upset making national headlines, Walker said he doesn’t enter the games against weaker nonconference teams with a different attitude.
“You’re just out there playing like it’s any other school when it’s a small school,” Walker said. “It’s just more news if the game is close or if you actually do get upset by them.”
With the possibility of an upset having become a reality for other SEC teams, the cliché of taking one game at a time might actually be useful advice for the Gators.
The last two years, Georgia Southern has played Florida close, giving UF even more reason to focus on tonight’s matchup in practice.
In 2007, the Gators took a narrow 52-49 win in Jacksonville, and last year, they needed Nick Calathes to take over and score 10 of the team’s final 19 points to escape with an 88-81 victory.
“There is a lot of parity. There are a lot of good coaches, a lot of good programs, a lot of good teams,” Donovan said. “With that, you’re going to have those kinds of situations. Hopefully we’ll get our guys ready and prepared to go Wednesday.”
