SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Auburn and Florida are the last two standing of a record 14 Southeastern Conference teams that made the NCAA Tournament. Only one of them will get to play for the national championship.
In a Final Four filled with No. 1 seeds, the SEC regular-season champion Tigers (32-5) play the conference tournament-winning Gators in the first national semifinal game Saturday in the Alamodome. The matchup pits All-Americans Johni Broome and Walter Clayton Jr. against each other yet again.
“The success that the league has had in the tournament has been pretty amazing,” Gators coach Todd Golden said. “The league obviously (got) a lot of respect, a lot of notoriety after the non-conference. Once you get to elite play, people wonder how real it is. I believe the results we have had so far in the NCAA Tournament speak to that.”
Florida (34-4), which has won 10 in a row since the start of March, twice during the regular season beat No. 1-ranked SEC teams. The Gators first won by 30 points at Tennessee, then a month later had a 90-81 win at Auburn on Feb. 8 that solidified how they felt about their team.
"It just gave us confidence because we always believed that we (were) the No. 1 team after we beat them,” said Alijah Martin, the only Gators player with Final Four experience (with FAU two years ago.)
“They just out-toughed us that game, they did everything that we didn’t do,” Auburn freshman guard Tahaad Pettiford said.
After the tournament's first Final Four matchup of SEC teams, the winner will play Duke or Houston with the opportunity to clinch their league's first national title in men's basketball since Kentucky in 2012. The last before that were Florida's back-to-back championships in 2006 and 2007.
Some turbulence along the wayAuburn, the No. 1 overall NCAA seed, began this season with an in-flight disturbance caused by players on the way to a win at Houston. The Tigers were 21-1 before losing to the Gators — the lone setback before that was at Duke in the eighth game. They lost three of their last four games before the NCAA tourney.
“Just continue this streak that we’re on these past four games. We’ve been the most physical team every team we’ve played against,” starting center Dylan Cardwell said, adding that the Tigers knew they could become a big bust or maybe the greatest team in school history. “We chose the latter.”
Facing Broome againAlex Condon, Florida's 6-foot-11 post from Australia, had no problem being physical with Broome when the teams first played. He plans to be again.
“He’s going to be wanting to come out and prove that he’s a better player than me,” Condon said. “So I think I did a good job last time just coming out and initiating the physicality with him. And yeah, I know I’m going to be ready to go.”
Condon had 17 points and 10 rebounds in that win over the Tigers. Broome had 18 points on 8-of-19 shooting with 11 rebounds.
Broome had 25 points and 14 rebounds in the South Regional final win over Michigan State last Sunday, but briefly left in the second half after his right elbow bent awkwardly during a hard fall. He grabbed ...
