LEXINGTON, Ky. -- Imagine this injustice. Imagine Kentucky, playing in emotionally charged Rupp Arena in the last home game of the season, beating Florida on Sunday. Imagine Kentucky lifting its NCAA Tournament stock to a No. 8 seed, while dropping Florida's NCAA Tournament stock to, well, a No. 8 seed.
Imagine Kentucky and Florida as equals.
Can't imagine it? Don't feel bad. My imagination can't make it happen, either.
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| Al Horford and Florida's other big men are way too much for Kentucky to handle. (AP) |
Florida gets it. Kentucky? Kentucky gets hammered. The final was 79-64.
Barring something silly in this week's SEC Tournament, No. 17 Florida (24-6, 10-6) will go into the NCAA Tournament with a No. 5 or a No. 6 seed. Kentucky has to beat Ole Miss on Thursday just to get into the NCAA Tournament. You read that right. The Wildcats (19-11, 9-7) positioned themselves for an NCAA bid by winning last week at Tennessee, but by playing dead Sunday -- Good dog! -- Kentucky had better beat Ole Miss to solidify its NCAA position. Sounds simple. Kentucky beat Ole Miss by 40 on Feb. 22.
Then again, you never know. Anything is possible with Kentucky, especially if Smith's disconnect from reality continues unabated. After Florida big men Joakim Noah and Al Horford combined for 28 points, 20 rebounds and five blocked shots, and played volleyball on the offensive glass with teammate Chris Richard, Smith scanned the stat sheet and said the difference Sunday was ... Lee Humphrey.
"It wasn't really inside," Smith said. "It was Lee Humphrey making jump shots that broke it open for them in the second half."
Humphrey hit two 3-pointers in 24 seconds to push Florida's 51-42 lead to 57-43. But for the other 39 minutes and 36 seconds, the story was Florida's enormous and enormously agile frontcourt doing as it pleased. Smith took the blame, but for the wrong reasons.
"It's my fault for not keeping a bigger matchup, a bigger guy, out there," he said.
Wrong. The four-guard lineup that Smith used -- and that Florida abused -- is Kentucky's most talented collection of players. It's not Smith's fault for playing them together. It's Smith's fault that, when he looks down his SEC bench, he sees OVC big men.
Florida coach Billy Donovan doesn't have that problem. He starts future pros in Noah (6-feet-11, 230 pounds) and Horford (6-9, 242), and he brings Richard (6-8, 255) off the bench. The Gators don't have enough minutes for 6-9, 247-pound senior Adrian Moss, who has 24 career starts but gets garbage minutes now. If Moss were at Kentucky, he'd be a hero.
Florida has beaten Kentucky four consecutive times, the first SEC team to do so since Tennessee in 1979-80. Donovan was asked why. It was an easy question, but not so easy. Donovan once worked at Kentucky. He just might, if Smith flees this sinking ship for the NBA after this season, work at Kentucky next year. In the meantime, he doesn't want to rub anything in. If you saw the game, you saw why Florida has become Kentucky's big brother. Florida is good and big. Kentucky is neither.
