While the UF women's basketball team was busy breaking the school record for 3-pointers on Sunday against Arkansas, none of the players had any idea how the final numbers would crunch.
All they knew was that the threes kept falling, and until they stopped, the team was not going to let up.
"We were just feeling good about ourselves," Sha Brooks said. "I know earlier in the week, a lot of us came in. We got a lot of shots in. We just had one of those nights where it just felt like we can't miss from the 3-point line."
The No. 11 Gators (20-2, 6-1 Southeastern Conference) went on to make 13 treys, which broke the previous school mark of 11 and boosted their score to 94, their highest output of the season.
Brooks, who tallied a season-high four shots from long distance, said she knew what her team was capable of doing.
"On any night, any one of our players can go off, even people who come off the bench," Brooks said. "It's tough to defend us when we're playing our best."
For Arkansas, it was a nightmare watching UF shoot just shy of 62 percent from beyond the arc.
Junior guard Susan Yenser, who added two from long range, saw what making shot after shot did to the Razorbacks.
"When you're on defense and somebody hits a three, it takes the wind out of you," Yenser said. "In Arkansas, even when they hit a couple threes, we came back down and answered their threes. So when they're trying to make a run and we answered with threes, they fell off."
UF has been a solid, consistent 3-point shooting team all year.
The Gators are shooting 37.2 percent from long distance on the season and in SEC play.
They are way ahead of pace to break the school record of 179 threes in one season, needing just 27 more to match that total, set last year.
Not only that, but they're averaging 6.9 treys per game thanks to shooters like Steffi Sorensen, who has made a three in 17 straight games. She leads the team with 53 from downtown.
Despite these impressive numbers, players and coaches don't think this team relies on the 3-point shot to win.
"We're really balanced," Yenser said. "We know that when our shots are hitting, it can get us through a ballgame. But also we know that we can get it inside and rely on that, too. So really we're kind of like a double threat."
UF coach Amanda Butler agrees that her team's shots come in the flow of the game.
"I'd like to think that what we rely on the most is our defense, and that leads to a lot of our threes because we're able to get a steal, get a rebound, push it back down and put them in matchup situations where a lot of times the shooter is who gets left," Butler said.
Making long range shots opens up the rest of the floor and forces defenders into a decision.
"You put the opposing defenses in really a little bit of a quandary," Butler said. "If you try to take away a 3-point shot, Marshae (Dotson) one-on-one on the block is really hard to guard."
With the way UF's been shooting, opponents must choose their fate wisely.
