Kiara Smith led the Gators with 13 points on the evening.
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – A short-handed Florida women’s basketball team battled Ole Miss on Thursday evening, but was unable to keep pace with the Rebels, falling 74-56 in Exactech Arena.
The Gators (10-5, 0-2 SEC) were led by Kiara Smith who ended the night with 13 points, seven rebounds, five assists and three steals. Making her fourth start of the year, Faith Dut contributed 12 points and five rebounds to conclude as the only other UF athlete in double figures.
For the game, Florida shot 24-of-60 (40%) from the field, including 0-for-8 from behind the three-point line, marking the first game since March 2, 2017 that the Gators didn’t convert on a three-point attempt, snapping a 131-game streak with at least one three. Ole Miss (13-1, 1-0 SEC) finished the evening 27-of-65 (41.5%) from the floor and also didn’t manage to convert a triple.
Thursday evening’s defensive performance of holding the Rebels to 0-of-4 from deep was the first time the Gators have held an opponent without a triple since LSU finished 0-of-2 on Feb. 25, 2016. It also marked the first time neither team has converted a three-pointer in a game since Feb. 22, 2015 when Texas A&M ended 0-for-6 and Florida finished 0-of-8.
Despite missing five players, UF managed to out-rebound the opposition, 44-41, led by 10 from sophomore Jordyn Merritt. Even though the Gators held an advantage in rebounding, Ole Miss ended with a 15-8 edge in second chance points.
A key difference in the game, Ole Miss concluded the night 20-of-33 (60.6%) from the free throw line while Florida shot just 8-of-15 (53.3%). Shakira Austin of Ole Miss led the Rebel effort, scoring 18 points with 10 rebounds, but ending 10-of-15 from the line. The visitors also force Florida into 25 turnovers, resulting in 19 fast break points.
The Gators didn’t let adversity keep them down, matching the Rebels to an 8-8 start in the opening frame following a pull-up jumper from Smith with 5:12 on the clock. Ole Miss would open up a 16-10 lead, eventually taking an 18-13 into the second quarter.
A quick four points from the Rebels would give them their biggest lead of the half at 21-13 with 8:42 in the second quarter, but four-consecutive points from Nina Rickards and a tough layup by Merritt would close the gap to four. The opposition managed to push their lead to 31-25 late in the period, but freshman Taliyah Wyche would bully her way into the paint for a layup, followed by a scoop-and-score from Smith, to end the half down 32-28.
Dut wasted no time getting the Gators on the board in the third quarter, knocking down a jumper to keep the game within four at the 8:57 mark, but an 8-0 run by the Rebels pushed the lead to 42-30 with just over six minutes on the clock. Both squads continued to exchange buckets before Ole Miss opened the game up late in the period, holding a 56-40 lead with one to play.
Despite falling behind by 18 in the fourth, the Gators continued to battle, closing the gap to just 11 with 4:14 left to play following an 8-1 run capped off by a Jeriah Warren layup. The Rebels would answer with an 9-2 run, however, earning the 74-56 victory.
Florida is back in action on Sunday, Jan. 9 when they travel to College Station, Texas, for a matchup with #25 Texas A&M.
Quotables
Head Coach Kelly Rae Finley
On Faith’s role for this game and the rest of the year…
“Faith has put in a lot of extra work as of late. I think her experience and her mindset has kind of shifted to understanding, like Kiki was talking about, what we need out of her role and what’s expected of her, she’s risen to the occasion. I thought she probably played her best game tonight. She’s really talented. She’s got great hands she has a great ability to finish around the rim and her athleticism should really serve us well as we move forward in conference.”
On Thursday’s game plan…
“Our game plan always consists of making reads and take the shot that’s open. If you feel good about it, then it’s a good shot and if you don’t, then it’s not a good shot. I thought we probably could’ve stretched the floor a little bit better, their close out speed was really quite good tonight. I think their length bothered us a little bit just in our thinking that we could get the shot off. But I thought that our post players had a good night for us. We could’ve come off our ball screens just a little bit harder I thought to put a little more pressure on them. I don’t think we quite drew enough fouls. As you see the foul count was quite lopsided and you know we needed to put pressure on them to attack them and go through them just a little bit more, but 33 free throws to 15, that’s a big discrepancy right there. Along with the turnovers that’s something else that we’ll need to address.”
Graduate Guard Kiara Smith
On her feelings heading into the rest of SEC play…
“Like coach Kelly said, just our confidence in one another and our ability to not complain when we are doing hard things. She always tells us that just because its hard doesn’t mean it’s bad. I think with this team we have a lot of people that want to get better each and every day and want to do whatever role we ask them to do in the game, whether that’s to come in and play thirty-five minutes or to come in and rebound a ball for us. Everybody has their role. Everybody knows exactly what we need for them to do. Everyday everybody comes in trying to perfect their role that we know we need them to do.”
On their position in the SEC…
“I’m not worried about our position right now. I’m not worried about our team right now at all. Our defense was good. I mean they got to the free throw line, that’s how they got a lot of their points, but just off of solid defense, they couldn’t really score towards the end of the game. We definitely locked down on that part, so I just think that moving forward, especially when we have everybody back, we are in really good shape. I’m not worried it’s still early in conference play. That’s two games down we still have a long time to go so definitely not worried. We are going to get back in the gym tomorrow, we are going to talk about this and move on to the next.”
Postgame Bites
– Ole Miss closes the gap in the series to 24-20 with the win.
– Faith Dut scored a season-high 12 points on the evening.
– Thursday was the first time since March 2, 2017 that the Gators didn’t convert on a three-point attempt, snapping a 131-game streak with at least one three.
– Thursday evening’s defensive performance of holding the Rebels to 0-of-4 from deep was the first time the Gators have held an opponent without a triple since LSU finished 0-of-2 on Feb. 25, 2016.
– Thursday also marked the first time neither team has converted a three-pointer in a game since Feb. 22, 2015 when Texas A&M ended 0-for-6 and Florida finished 0-of-8.
– Smith now owns 1,255 points, just two behind Jennifer George (2009-13) for 19th all-time.
– Smith also now boasts 362 career assists, the 11th-best number in school history.
– With three steals, she moves to 190 in her career (10th in school history).
– #GoGators –
