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Category: NCAAB

Written by James Brown, Co-Founder of Gatorsfirst.com

Today at approximately 6:30 ET, the Florida Gators officially ended their NCAA Tournament drought. 

The Florida Gators will meet the BYU Cougars on Thursday, March 18 in Oklahoma City. They are a 10 seed, and BYU is a 7 seed. 
After a rough day for bubble teams yesterday (Houston surprising UTEP, Mississippi State upsetting Vandy, many more) speculation was rapant that Dan Werner would play yet another game in front of his under-appreciative fans. 

Instead, they are heading to OKC. Some more facts below... 

The fact that the Gators received a 10 seed is amazing. This means, in the eyes of the committee, it wasn't even close. Perhaps we should take a hint, as Gator fans, and evaluate our team for what they are (NCAA Tourney-bound) and not for what they aren't (back-to-back national champions). After all, the #3 seed 2006 Florida Gators were 10-6 in regular season conference play. The difference? Those Gators were undefeated in non-conference games (including the NCAA Tourney) and undefeated on a neutral court (including both post-season tournaments). The 10-6 regular season SEC record must mean something compared to our 9-7 showing this year, however. 

Another amazing fact concerning UF's seed this March: two of our biggest wins (probably THE two biggest wins) were over Tennessee and Michigan State. Those teams received a #6 and a #5 seed, respectively. This made the announcement that the Florida Gators are headed to March Madness all the more amazing. 

The last two times the Final Four was in Indianapolis (in 2000 and 2006), the Florida Gators made the Final Four. They are 3-1 in those games (the lone loss being the 2000 NCAA Championship against Michigan State). Hey, weirder things have happened- including the last time the Final Four was in Indianapolis (Florida's opponent was 13-seed, bubble team George Mason). 

The Florida Gators hold the NCAA's longest active streak of NCAA Tournament wins, with 12. Additionally, in the last six years, we've now made the NCAA tournament four times (05, 06, 07, 10), won the SEC Tournament three times (05, 06, 07) and made 3 final fours (NCAA: 06, 07; NIT: 08).


Oklahoma City is between 3 and 4 hours from my house. I am seriously considering making the trip, depending on what time the game is (not announced yet). Due to Kansas being the top seed in the other pool, and Kansas State being the top seed in our pool, tickets on craigslist were going for $300-400 immediately after the matchups were announced on CBS. Ouch!

You can read the original article here: http://gatorsfirst.com/index.php/fl
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t-drought.html

Category: NCAAB

Written by James Brown, Co-Founder of Gatorsfirst.com

So the other day, I started thinking about what, exactly, could be the problem with our basketball team.

We lack depth.  I studied the early departures during Donovan's entire tenure at Florida last summer.

We lack certain skill sets.  Again, is Billy Donovan's recruiting to blame?  Is Dan Werner just a bum with no business being on anyone's team?

Then I really started thinking: which team would be better off in 2009-10, our present rotation (we run 8 deep) or a 9-man rotation consisting of guys that either left Florida early or aren't playing now for other reasons?

Oh, and I'll answer those other questions, too...

Is Donovan's recruiting to blame?  I say no, he has gotten the right guys in school.  Keeping them here, and healthy, has been an issue.  These things happen, and the margins are smaller (as far as prospects not panning out) in college basketball than football.  What I mean is one player leaving early or getting kicked out of school or transferring for playing time issues impacts your entire team more, whereas half of most football recruiting classes accomplish little-to-nothing in their collegiate careers.  (Conversely, certain recruits can entirely turn a team around, but as I showed in the previous link, the success of Donovan's teams is tied more closely with the number of years they've collectively played together more than counting on one John Wall-type impact.  Also, Billy doesn't cheat.)

Another point on recruiting- one I discussed with a fan last week- is that, with the early signing period, a lot of guys are signing way before your needs are fully known- especially if you have surprise transfers, etc.  Additionally, any 'bump' you expect to see from a national title would not be seen until another year out.  The 2006 class (Dan Werner being the only one left) was signed before we won the Tournament.  The 2007 class (Nick Calathes, etc.) was that first class delivered after the title- and featured two five-stars (Calathes and Chandler Parsons).  These were the first five-stars Billy brought in since Anthony Roberson.  So you can see that we did receive a bit of a 'bump' in recruting, but you can also see how little it necessarily impacts success: the '03 and '04 classes, the foundation of the back-to-back titles, had no five-star recruits.  In other words, lay off Billy's recruiting.  It's getting as good now (especially if we get Brandon Knight) as it's ever been.

I think we've already covered the Dan Werner question here and here.  I will emphasize that his playing out of position for 4 years cannot be understated.  Not every recruit is cut out to play 35 minutes of highly successful basketball per night.  Because of depth issues, we need Werner to play more than just a role, even though he's a better fit as a role player.  I love the guy's effort, and feel awful for the way most of you have treated him.  The true story of Dan Werner is the story of all his teammates that fucked him over by leaving Florida before their eligibility ran out.

Which brings me to the central debate of this post:  which of these rosters would win in a game?  Which is better off competing over the season?  Since we're playing with health issues here, assume everyone is healthy.

Our starting five: Erving Walker, Kenny Boynton, Chandler Parsons, Alex Tyus, Vernon Macklin.

Our bench: Dan Werner, Ray Shipman, Erik Murphy.

The Other Guys starting five: Nick Calathes, Jai Lucas (starting him because he and Nick started together when he was here), Jonathan Mitchell, Marreese Speights, Allan Chaney.

Other Guys bench: Adam Allen, Brandon Powell, Kenny Kadji, Eloy Vargas.

I know, it's a reach to say Speights would ever be a 4-year player.  The good news is, if he bails, the Other Guys have depth in the front court.  Allen gives them an extra 3-point shooting threat we don't really have, but their back court is defensively limited. Walker is smaller than Lucas but a better defender, and Calathes hasn't cared about playing defense, ever.  They have two guys better suited to play the point, though, and Powell and Mitchell can play some two-guard to run out some interesting lineups.

Anyway, what do you think?  Would you watch this sort of Orange and Blue game?

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Category: NCAAB

Written by Jason Kirchhoff, Contributor to Gatorsfirst.com

Every year at Midnight Madness, my buddy Burnstein and I take a look at the new Freshmen and each pick one to be “our Boy.” Once the choice is made, you must claim allegiance to this player and defend him throughout his stay in Gainesville. While it’s easy to just snap up a McDonald’s All-American and call it a day, it’s far more rewarding to gamble on a lesser known player and then pound your chest a few years later when your boy is torching the SEC, as you shout out some prophetic nonsense along the lines of “I just knew,” or “there was something about him.” This decision can sometimes work out well (my boy Joakim Noah), and sometimes backfire (my boy Allan Chaney).

In October 2006, it backfired. Bigtime. I went out on a limb and picked a nimble looking young forward out of New Jersey with some solid high school credentials.

Yes, Dan Werner is my Boy. And yes, I have spent 3 years defending him, championing his effort and toughness and willingness to take on defensive matchups for which he did not have the physical gifts necessary for success. I even defended him upon learning that he once hit on GatorsFirst founder James Brown’s wife at Swamp (they weren’t engaged yet…no ring, no problem I say). He was my boy, and that’s how the game works. When his trademark shot (the 3-pointer off the shot clock) went up, I was the only one in the O-Dome without my hands on my head shouting “NO!”

Then, about a month ago, I violated the one and only rule of the game. I started bashing Dan Werner. It was sort of like the woman who stands by her man through repeated bouts of alcoholism and abuse, only to eventually - and usually far too late - reach her breaking point, pack up the station wagon and move back in with her mother in Palatka. Put simply, I had just had it. It wasn’t just the stats, though they were certainly abysmal (as of this writing, only 5 made field goals in the last 9 games, despite averaging 24.7 minutes on the floor). It was that the scant redeeming qualities – the tough defense, the hustle plays, the heady inbounds passes – had turned into fouls and turnovers. Suddenly the three off the shot clock became an improvement, as at least it hit something. There was nothing left to defend. The “slump” excuse was long past its expiration date. Burnstein wasn’t happy with me. It’s not like his ’06 boy Brandon Powell had panned out. “Play by the rules,” he told me.

On Wednesday night, things changed. I will, for the rest of this season, support Dan Werner unconditionally. And I encourage all of the Gator Nation to join me. And here’s why:

With about two minutes left in a close game, the ball found its way into the hands of Dan Werner, standing at the elbow. After a split second of clear discomfort, Dan realized that, as usual, he was unguarded. He decided to shoot, which was fine considering the nearest defender was under the basket, 15 feet away. The next 2 seconds was the most heartbreaking moment I’ve ever had in my years of support for this guy. Dan Werner clutched, leapt, and shot his 15-foot jumper not an inch more than 12 feet. It was without a doubt one of the worst airballs in Gator history, and almost assuredly the worst in Werner’s entire life, not just his stay in Gainesville. And it made clear something I had yet to realize.

Dan Werner has reached a mental breaking point. And the Gator Nation is to blame. The escalating level of hate and vitriol and calling for his head, the repeated claims of a wasted scholarship, it all needs to end. Today. We’ve destroyed him. He’s just a college student people. This isn’t the pros. Look what we’ve done. It’s like watching a shelter dog trying to play basketball. I feel like a sports psychologist, pressed with this charge, would turn into Office Space’s Dr. Swanson: “Wow, that’s messed up.”

Back to the airball. If you can find a replay, check out the body language. The jump is tentative and weak and the shot is brutally short-armed. This is a shot that in probably 17 years of organized basketball Dan has taken 20,000 times. The short-arm, as any beer pong veteran can attest, is an outcome that only appears when you’re thinking, deeply, madly, about your shot. When everyone is laughing at you and you’re so desperate to get back on track that all muscle memory disappears and it’s like you’re taking the first shot of your entire life. I’m no longer in Gainesville, but I’d bet my life savings that Dan Werner can’t walk from one end of Turlington to the other without a thousand eyes casting shame upon him. We have defeated the man to the point that the only supporters he has left in the world are his parents and, for some reason, coach Donovan. And it stops today. Dan is a four year player with a national championship ring. And we will respect that. I will allow us to acknowledge that he is “struggling”. And that’s it as far as criticism is concerned. Beyond that, listen to Bambi, that wimpy deer. If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.

This mental break down, it happens to athletes from time to time. It’s usually in individual sports, and particularly prevalent in golf, which I know from experience is 99.37% mental. Former British Open champion Ian Baker-Finch, already struggling with a career-threatening confidence problem, once duck-hooked a tee shot so badly that he put his driver back in the bag, walked off the course, and never played again. All time great Sam Snead once had such a mental block on short puts (known as the yips), that he actually started straddling the ball and using his putter like a hockey stick, just needing to change it up somehow.

It happens in team sports too. Former Yankee second baseman Chuck Knoblauch once famously, and laughably, hit Keith Olberman’s mom in the face with an errant throw to first. Less laughable was eventual demotion to switch hitter and part-time left fielder. Cleveland Indians catcher and cliché dunce Rube Baker couldn’t throw it back to the pitcher, though he solved his problem by memorizing the stats of Playboy models and reciting them during the throwing motion. Baker was of course from Major League II, which is clearly fictional considering that Coach Lou Brown died despite a mustache so glorious it would earn absolute immortality for a real man. Still, fake as Baker was, the flaw was based on the real life struggles of former Mets catcher Mackey Sasser.

And it has happened to former Gators as well. Rex Grossman, constantly hounded by obsessive Chicago Bears fans, pretty clearly lost his confidence while there. In fact, Grossman’s father recently wrote an article blasting Bears management and fans for their perpetual negativity and criticism of QBs there. Closer to home, and actually on the hardwood, is the story of Brett Nelson. The hillbilly sharpshooter was a vital member of the 2000 Gator basketball team that made it to the NCAA finals. A sophomore that year, some analysts surmised that he could be a lottery pick. The next year he developed a hitch in his shot, and by his senior season was a bit-part bench player. The unrelated lesson there is, if you’re a projected first round pick, for the love of god, go pro. But more important to this article, it was yet another example of an unrelenting erosion of confidence derailing a career.

My point is that, in most of these cases, the attitude of fans went from amused early on to highly sympathetic as the problem worsened. No one likes to see an elite athlete lose their stuff, and it’s particularly jarring to see it happen not from to injury or fatigue, but due to a swift and systematic destruction of confidence that may have taken decades to develop (or maybe 15 years in Werner’s case). The public is rather unanimous in its support and hope for golfer David Duval to get past his mental demons and return to his former glory. I’m calling for the same level of support for Thunder Dan Werner. I want to bring attention to his confidence issues to jump start the switch from ridicule to sympathy that always comes in these cases. There aren’t many games left, and unless Albania starts a developmental league soon, the pro prospects don’t look good for Mr. Werner. I ask you, Gator Nation, to put a hard stop on the hate and see if we can’t get this guy back on his feet. If you see him on campus, tell him that you’re pulling for him. And tell him there’s at least one person out there who strongly, happily, proudly, refers to him as “my BOY, Dan Werner!”

You can find the original article here: http://gatorsfirst.com/index.php/fl
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t/a-plea-for-dan-werner.html

Category: NCAAF

Written by James Brown, Co-Founder of Gatorsfirst.com

Of course you can always visit Gators First for up-to-the-second Gator coverage right here .

But I'm going to use this space each week to recap some of the more important stories, and give my take.  I'd hate for the less internet-nerdy of our Gator fans to miss out on the entire week's stories because we covered something when it happened, and moved on to something new before you people with busy lives even heard the latest Gator news.

I'll also throw in some other odds and ends that don't belong in other blogs.

The Gator Nation's Past Week

The baby Gators are #1: Florida took home the nation's consensus #1 recruiting class .  They have their work cut out for them to be considered, results-wise, among what I'd call the top two classes in Florida football history: the 1993 class  (4 consecutive SEC Titles, 1 National Title) and the 2006 class (2 SEC titles, 3 division titles, 2 BCS Titles). The good news is that so many of them are already on campus, and we have the program depth to work in this embarrassment of riches over the next couple years, rather than forcing some of these guys into SEC action before they are properly groomed.  It all rests on the health of Johnny Brantley.

Two big wins for Billy Donovan's bunch.  Winning that game at Alabama on Thursday night took toughness, and holding on yesterday was also huge for us.  Jarvis Varnado and Mississippi State have been a tough match for us the last couple of seasons, and winning like that- with Vernon Macklin coming alive as an impact player- could mean great things for this team down the stretch.

George Edwards, nice knowing you .  The recently hired Florida Gators Co-Defensive Coordinator (hired for Charlie Strong in early January, after the bowl game) bolted the day after signing day to take the Buffalo Bills' vacant defensive coordinator job.  He had little to no impact on recruiting, so one can't point to anything fishy with the timing.  And taking an NFL Coordinator position is better than being a college position coach and co-coordinator, no matter how you look at it.  Look for Chuck Heater, the co-coordinator, to resume exclusive duties this late in the offseason coaching shuffle, and for Urban (er, Steve Addazio?) to poach and up-and-coming youngster as a position coach, rather than a big-name hire.

Jeff Demps, welcome back.  In his first track meet of the spring , he with the explosives, showed no ill effects from his injury suffered in the Sugar Bowl in coming with .04 seconds of automatically qualifying to run for the NCAA Championships later this season.  This is fantastic news for a first-time starting QB in the SEC, and no doubt Johnny Brantley must be smiling somewhere.

The Gator Nation's Week to Come

The Gator basketball team has a huge week ahead, as they are squarely competing with Devan Downey and the Gamecocks for not only 4th place in the SEC East, but likely an NCAA Tournament bid.  They travel to Columbia, SC to take on Downey and his backup singers on Wednesday night (8 ET, SEC Network).  Then on Saturday night they have a rare February non-conference matchup with fellow bubble team Xavier (6 ET, ESPN).  One would probably expect them to go 1-1, but going 2-0 this week would be a boon for this team's rising NCAA hopes.

For tonight's Super Bowl , I can't pick against the Colts.  They've won every game they tried to win this year.  They have a better defense- with or without Dwight Freeney.  And Bobby McCray by himself can't continue the Gators' dominance over Peyton Manning, right?

Speaking of the Super Bowl, we will finally get to see Tim Tebow's Super Bowl Ad tonight.  Regardless of whether you agree with him or not, he and his backer have a right to pay CBS to put whatever message they want on TV during this game.  Instead of everyone focusing on his stance, shouldn't we instead be talking about how refreshing it is to hear an athlete outspoken about something other than 'feeding his family ' or his own image?  If CBS' intent was to do anything but fill their ad slots (did they reject an ad by another athlete with a conflicting opinion? Doubtful, as no other current athletes come to mind who are so willing to stand for something), especially in a year when companies such as Pepsi have opted out of paying for the expensive ad space, then there is an ethical problem.  Otherwise, viewers of the ad should be intelligent enough to make their own decisions on the abortion issue regardless of which athlete/celebrity is taking which stance during a football game.

Go Cure Cancer.  Go Gators

I believe strongly that any sort of knowledge means nothing without sharing it with the less knowledgeable.  Each week I'll try to think of quick tidbits I can either learn about or explain from my point of view, to hopefully provoke some thought among the Gator Nation.  I would hope the topics are somewhat interesting to you.  Feel free to leave me feedback below.

In my time at the University of Florida, I worked with the Electrical Engineering Department's International Center for Lightning and Testing, and have always had an interest in physics.  This week's fact comes from something I am often asked when people learn of my educational background.  

Why can't we design a power plant based on harvesting lightning for domestic electrical power?  Often people hear of the enormous power levels contained in a lightning strike, but the time in which this power is delivered is so short, that the energy delivered by a strike isn't nearly as impressive  (on the order of billions of Joules, levels that per strike would power 5 100 W light bulbs, continuously, for a year).  Additionally, most of this energy (estimated at 99% to 99.99%) is not electrical energy- it's dissipated in the flash that we see, the heat that is generated, and the thunder that we hear, among other things.  Throw in the fact that we have no way of casting a wide enough net to 'capture' a significant number of strikes each year, and any conjecture on using lightning for the world's energy problems is not worth the effort. For more details, see Lightning: Physics and Effects, a text by the University of Florida's own Drs. Vladimir Rakov and Martin Uman.

Gainesville's Own

I think I'm going to use this section to take very random things associated with Gainesville, and use them to give my opinion on something going on in the world, Gator Nation, or other local topics.  Sometimes I may just be sharing a funny local story, or talking about something else specific to the area, and giving a thumbs up or down.  After all, I was born at Shands and went to 18 consecutive seasons of Florida basketball games (season tickets) before graduating and moving to Texas- without these things I wouldn't be here today and there likely wouldn't be a Gators First.

In the past week, I've been playing a Less Than Jake playlist on my iPod while at the gym.  LTJ is a Gainesville band that will always have some meaning to Gainesvillains of my generation- their all-ages shows at now-gone venues such as the Covered Dish came along at the right time in my life, when I was really starting to learn about music outside of whatever was on the radio, my parents played, or was on MTV.  A couple things stick out now when thinking about that time period, which is really not that long ago: (1) the internet didn't exist anywhere close to the way it does today, and definitely wasn't used to experience music now and (2) MTV actually played music videos, as more than filler between reality shows.  You'd get a Bush video followed by Rod Stewart singing in a closet followed by Tupac.  At any rate, I was learning to explore music on different levels- outside of the 'mainstream' sources of the day, and LTJ was the local act my friends and I latched onto.  And this past week, I rediscovered some of their music by creating a playlist for the gym on my iPod...

So I'll give a thumbs up here to Gainesville's Own Less Than Jake.  Go check out their newer albums, if you haven't kept up with them, or go listen to them, period, if you're unfamiliar.  But the best way would be to go experience the energy of a live LTJ show.

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Category: NCAAB