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UF Looks To Go Out On Top

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By MIKE DiFERDINANDO

Tribune correspondent

Published: March 17, 2009

GAINESVILLE - The University of Florida men's basketball team watched the NCAA Tournament selection show Sunday just like all the others.

But even the Gators knew that any chance of seeing orange and blue light up the screen was a long shot.

"We definitely watched it, but we figured our name wasn't going to be called," point guard Nick Calathes said. "Obviously, in our mind we knew we didn't get enough wins to get in."

Instead, the Gators will play in the NIT.

UF (23-10) earned one of the tournament's four No. 1 seeds and will play the first three rounds at home.

"It's tough," Calathes said. "One of your goals at the beginning a season is to win the NCAA Tournament."

Florida made it to Madison Square Garden and the semifinals of last season's NIT before losing to Massachusetts.

UF opens the NIT against Jacksonville (18-13) at 8 tonight at the O'Connell Center.

The Dolphins come into the NIT having won the Atlantic Sun Conference regular-season title, and having played an out-of-conference schedule that included Florida State, Ohio Sate and Georgetown.

"We're still playing a basketball game," Calathes said. "If you look at the NIT there are really good teams who didn't get in. It will be a good opportunity to finish the year out the way we want to."

UF suffered yet another late-season collapse, losing seven of its last 12 games.

"Coming down the stretch, if you look at our games, we played Mississippi State, we played LSU and we played Tennessee," UF coach Billy Donovan said. "Those are all the teams that are in the tournament. And really, to be honest with you, teams that were better than us."

UF finished the season with an RPI of 51, the 86th-best strength of schedule, one win against a top-50 RPI team (Pacific-10 Conference regular-season champion Washington) and a 2-6 record in conference road games.

"I think we need to get physically tougher and I think we really need to get a whole lot mentally tougher," Donovan said.

CHANEY OUT: Donovan said Tuesday that freshman forward Allan Chaney is likely finished for the season.

"He's got a ligament problem that's kind of attached to the bone in his foot," Donovan said. "I wouldn't anticipate him playing the rest of the year."

The 6-foot-8, 231-pound forward from New London, Conn., played in 23 games, including two starts, and averaged 3.0 points and 2.1 rebounds per game.

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