Despite missing two of their strongest players in their matchup with the Texas A&M Aggies (15-5, 3-4 SEC), the Florida Gators women’s basketball team (11-8, 2-5 SEC) came away with a 63-51 victory, Sunday afternoon.
With senior guard Aliyah Matharu sidelined due to an illness and senior center Ra Shaya Kyle still out due to a knee injury, the Gators received contributions from all across the roster to secure their second SEC win of the season against the Aggies.
“Everybody on our team brings something of so much value,” Florida head coach Kelly Rae Finley said. “The Gators did what we do best tonight, and it was really fun to see us excel on the defensive end of the floor.”
Senior guard Leilani Correa secured her fifth 20+ point performance in her last six games, racking up 24 points while going 8-for-17 from the field and 7-for-10 from the free throw line.
While Correa excelled from the perimeter, senior forward Faith Dut dominated in the paint. Dut chipped in with six points, nine rebounds and two blocks in the game.
As for Texas A&M, their offensive struggles piled up early in the afternoon. The Aggies shot 31.3% (21-for-67) from the field, in what proved to be one of Florida’s strongest defensive performances so far this season.
“Yesterday, what you didn’t see was us struggle through practice with ball screen defense,” Finley said. “Many times, we could have hung our head, and we could have quit, and we could have said, ‘I’m just not going to get it. It doesn’t matter.’ No, it matters. That matters, because it mattered today, and we were so much better on the defensive end of the floor because of it.”
In the first quarter alone, Florida forced six turnovers and held Texas A&M to 2-for-14 shooting. The Aggies did eventually put up more of a fight as the afternoon went on, but their resistance proved to be futile.
In the first quarter, Correa tallied four points and a perfectly placed assist inside the paint to Dut. Senior guard Zippy Broughton also chipped in with four points of her own, while Dut racked up four rebounds in the period. With all the momentum now on their side, Florida held on to a 17-7 lead at the end of the quarter.
Dut’s strong early performance served as a reminder of what the senior forward is capable of on both ends of the floor. With Kyle out, Dut stepped up as Florida’s primary presence in the paint.
“It’s not a secret that sometimes, I take the back seat or I don’t perform as great as I can be,” Dut said. “And that’s okay. I take that on the chin, and I hear everything that happens. But at the end of the day, I do this for my teammates, I do it for my program, and that’s that.”
Dut got off to a hot start in the second quarter, knocking down a fast-break layup and hitting Correa on a cross-court dime in back-to-back possessions. Dut also met Aggies senior forward Maliyah Johnson at the hoop for a massive rejection while managing to keep the ball in play.
Florida’s offense started to sputter as the first half came to a close. At one point, the Gators missed five consecutive field goals, allowing the Aggies to cut their deficit down to 24-17.
Nevertheless, UF came right back with a fast-break layup from Correa and a 3 from graduate student Kenza Salgues to take a 29-18 lead into the halftime break.
By the end of the first half, Correa had 11 points on 5-of-8 shooting. Finley singled her out after the game for her basketball IQ and scoring abilities, also noting how many teams have composed game plans to counter her offensive output.
Correa, however, remains unfazed by these challenges.
“I don’t really feel as much pressure as you may think that I do,” Correa said. “Most of the time, my teammates are getting me the ball. Whether it’s backdoor cuts, whether it’s getting open for a three, I don’t have to go off to create my own shot a lot of the time. Just trusting my teammates, it takes a lot of the pressure off of my shoulders.”
But after a rough first half, Texas A&M came back with a vengeance in the third quarter.
The Aggies forced four Gators turnovers en route to a 13-0 run early on in the second half. Senior guard Endyia Rogers scored nine consecutive points for the Aggies, while fellow senior guard Aicha Coulibaly followed her up with a pair of layups on back-to-back possessions.
Just like that, Florida’s double-digit lead disappeared, and they now trailed 31-29.
Soon after the Aggies’ big run, both offenses went virtually silent. From the six-minute mark up until the final two minutes of the quarter, neither squad converted on a single field goal attempt.
Coulibaly finally broke the dry spell with a put-back layup, but UF sophomore guard Eriny Kindred responded with an and-1 layup of her own two possessions later. By the end of the quarter, the Gators clawed their way back up to a 39-36 lead.
Having barely survived the Aggies’ third quarter scare, the Gators came into the fourth quarter ready to close. After a quick layup from Coulibaly to open up the quarter, Florida went on an 11-2 run to jump back out to a double-digit lead.
Kindred capped off the run with a monstrous block on Rogers, which she immediately followed up with a pair of free throws on the other end. The Aggies would not go down without a fight, trimming their deficit back down to as little as five points, but the Gators held on for the remainder of the afternoon to clinch the victory.
The Gators travel to Baton Rouge to face off against the No. 7 LSU Tigers Feb. 4. Tip-off is set for 2 p.m and the game will be broadcast on SEC Network.
Facing the defending national champions will be a tough challenge for Florida, but Finley is confident her squad is ready to fight.
“Coach [Kim] Mulkey is a heck of a basketball coach, and they’ve got a tremendous atmosphere,” Finley said. “It’ll be a great opportunity for us to go to Baton Rouge and compete.”
Contact Jack Meyer at jmeyer@alligator.org. Follow him on X @jackmeyerUF.
Jack Meyer is a third-year journalism major and a sports reporter for The Alligator. In his free time, he enjoys running, spending time with friends, playing video games, and watching the Miami Heat and Miami Dolphins.
