Records: Florida 16-10 (6-7 SEC); Texas A&M 16-10 (5-8 SEC)
Next up for Florida: vs. #2 Auburn, Saturday, 2 p.m., ESPN
Notable
* Florida rallied from 12 down with 11 minutes to go and took a late lead, but Texas A&M hit three free throws to regain the lead with 19 seconds left and got a stop on Florida’s final possession.
* Colin Castleton recorded his seventh double-double of the season and 10th of his career with 15 points and 15 rebounds. It marked Castleton’s second-most boards in a single game in his career (16 vs. FSU, 11/14/21).
* Castleton joins Marreese Speights, Al Horford and Udonis Haslem as the only Gators with multiple 15-point, 15-rebound games since 1996.
* Colin Castleton’s 10 rebounds in the first half marked the first double-digit rebounding half by a Gator since Kerry Blackshear Jr. grabbed 10 in the first half vs. Auburn (1/18/20).
* Castleton also became the fifth Florida transfer to record 600 career points, joining Dorian Finney-Smith, Jalen Hudson, Vernon Macklin and Mike Rosario.
* Myreon Jones scored all 10 of his points in the second half, hitting three 3-pointers. Jones is 19-for-35 (.543) beyond the arc over the last five games.
* Florida rolled out its 11th different starting lineup of the season, and CJ Felder made his first start as a Gator. Felder scored the first four points of the game and finished with seven points and five rebounds.
Head Coach Mike White
On how frustrating it was for the game to end this way…
“It was really disheartening for our guys. As somber of a locker room that I’ve been in in a while. I think our guys know how hard they played, and you’re up late, a stop away, a missed free throw away… Really resilient group and I’m proud of the physical effort. There is a lot of stuff we need to clean up. Credit A&M, they were terrific defensively swarming the basketball. I know Colin had 15 and 15, but still, I think they did a tremendous job on him just creating havoc. They go 16-of-16 from the foul line, they hit a couple shot-clock buzzer beaters, they played with poise, and it could’ve gone either way. We were right there and did a lot of really good things considering the fact that we struggled so much, especially offensively, in the first half. It was a tough one for our guys.”
On what was said to the team at the end of the game…
“It’s more team right now. We’ll have a chance to talk to Phlan as we travel and as we get home. He’s a mature guy. We made a bunch of mistakes throughout the game, so did A&M. That’s basketball. We didn’t lose the game because of one of those couple plays. There were 50 things that we could have done better. I think Phlan, deep down, knows that, but I’ll remind him of that. He did a lot of really good things and played incredibly hard. I thought we were terrific defensively as well… Coming in here and forcing 33 percent, 14 turnovers, 2-of-18 from three. I mean, we did enough defensively, obviously, and Phlan was a big part of that. I thought he played with a lot of energy and effort. Unfortunately, down the stretch on those last two or three minutes, we had some miscues offensively and defensively.”
#12 Colin Castleton, Senior Forward
On the first half…
“I feel like we just had a couple of careless turnovers. We took a couple of bad shots that were out of character and we weren’t supposed to do. It was little things like that – just turning the ball over and taking careless shots… I feel like we played hard the whole game. We gave it everything we had. But, with the little stuff like that, you’re going lose games if you just do it consistently. We did a little bit of it in the first half and we had to claw our way back. It just wasn’t enough.”
On the final play of the game and the foul by Phlandrous Fleming Jr….
“It was tough, unlucky. He was closing out really hard on a good shooter. I don’t remember if [Phlandrous] hit his leg or whatever, but I just know he fouled him. I thought he played well tonight. He played with a lot of energy. He also had a good look at the end, offensively. But, we had our chances to get that win, we just didn’t secure it.”
On his performance…
“It’s cool, but I just want to win. I hate that we lost, it really drives me crazy because I just want to win the game. I didn’t really care what I was doing, and there were a lot of things that I could’ve done better – I missed a couple of layups, missed a lob, and I never layup a lob, so that was out of character there. It’s cool, but I just wanted to win the game and that’s really it.”
