Ohio State 62, Florida 49 (Final)

[Best Buckeye]

Billy Donovan said:


Notebook: Donovan calls Ohio State crowd 'classy'



Sun sports writer
12:07 am, December 23, 2007
COLUMBUS, Ohio ? Florida coach Billy Donovan knew his young team was going to get a test from the crowd in its first road game of the season.


For the most part, though, Donovan said he felt the Ohio State fans conducted themselves with class.
"I thought their crowd was terrific," Donovan said. "Very classy. They were focused on cheering hard for their team and what they were doing."
Florida has had some ugly incidents in past road games in the Southeastern Conference in recent seasons. Joakim Noah and Matt Walsh were favorite targets. Opposing fans at Florida State and Vanderbilt stormed the court following wins against the Gators last season.
The lone target that emerged late in the game was Florida freshman forward Chandler Parsons, who was mocked by the crowd after air-balling a free-throw attempt. After the miss, fans chanted "air ball" each time Parsons touched the ball.
Freshman guard Jai Lucas said he liked the atmosphere, even though fans were cheering against him.
"I wasn't nervous or scared," Lucas said. "That's why you play college basketball, to play in big games like this in big arenas like this."

 

[Jaxbuck]

Quit raining on the "redemption" parade.

We said it over in the game thread, no offense but if I had to guess right now I'd say UF isn't one of the better teams we will face all year. No real redemption but nice to stop a "Florida continues its dominanace over OSU" headline and resulting T-shirt sales.

This is the point of contention I had with the worst of UF's fan base last year BTW and where I saw a lot of UF fans I previously thought of as decent get stupid on me. My point:

The title(s) run you guys had was one in a million, the height of success any big school has enjoyed in major athletics in most of our life times. We had he unfortunate distinction of having the same type of success but just one notch less and it just happened to coincide with your zenith.

Instead of revel in UF's success and at least have a grudging respect for how hard it was to even be there to face UF in those games, I saw many UF fans go to the dark side of it. They seemed to take more pleasure in insulting OSU and our fans than enjoying their teams success. I still to this day see more t-shirts making fun of us being the runner up in those games than just plain 3 NC type t-shirts.

I said then and stick by it now, enjoy your success but we'll reload better. Of course it was just sour grapes and living in the past for the recently converted UF sith lords. They were going to be able to keep that kind of winning up for the next decade at least and as we all know by now, those losses mean OSU sucks for all time going foreward and trivializes anything we've done in the past.

For that not so small element of your fan base this game did mean something although I'm sure they won't admit it now.

 

[osugrad21]

CPD

Different teams, different result

Buckeyes' veterans provide leadership in 'rematch' victory
Sunday, December 23, 2007Doug Lesmerises
Plain Dealer Reporter
Columbus- Sure, Florida beat Ohio State in two national championship games last season, in both football and basketball. But it was a 26-point regular-season loss in Gainesville last Dec. 23rd that ruined the Buckeyes' Christmas.
"Last year, our Christmas Day, all we could think about was getting beat," OSU senior point guard Jamar Butler said. "When we go home and spend time with our families now, everything will be positive."
After an energetic 62-49 victory over the Gators on Saturday filled with another round of solid zone defense, plenty of rebounds and well-distributed scoring, the 8-3 Buckeyes gathered a few more reasons to enjoy their three-day break. And the fans liked it even more.


Cont...

 

[Taosman]

"I dont mind losing to Ohio State. But I can't stand their fans. Worst fanbase in all of college sports and they are proud of that."

 

[LitlBuck]

The one aspect of the Ohio State effort yesterday that stood out to me was the intensity on defense. If they can play with that type of intensity every game, we will be much better.

 

[Best Buckeye]

The one aspect of the Ohio State effort yesterday that stood out to me was the intensity on defense. If they can play with that type of intensity every game, we will be much better.

I agree and also realize that they didn't play a top team so in that regard they will have to play with even greater intensity in order to improve and be able to compete with the big boys.

 

[graveyard.roses]

What I got from this game is that the team has a ton of potential and that David Lighty's work offensively will push the team far. David played like he is supposed to be playing: Driving and slashing, pulling up for the mid range, playing great defense. He's the shooting guard/creator that the team needs. He, along with Evan Turner, is what gives this team another dimension. When they're not on their game, the offense struggles because it's just dump it in to Koufos and shoot three pointers, hoping to make them.

Their role is similar to Ron Lewis' role last year.

 

[Fungo Squiggly]

Solid game all around. A lot of fun and a pretty decent atmosphere.

to Twiggy. The dude just kicked ass Saturday. Good shooting, great rebounding, and some nice passing. The block on the UF 3-on-1 break that ended up going out off of them was just tremendous.

Lauderdale sure does have a pretty shooting motion on his free throws. I mentioned that it would be ugly before he shot his 2. First one was smooth as silk. I chuckled a bit and my father mentioned that he'd probably bank the next one in.

As far as the referees.....I'm more than a little bit vocal at games regarding the failure to penalize sloppy footwork.....that asshole behind you screaming "TRAAAAAVVVVEEEELLLLLL!!!!"....probably me.....but good lord...these refs called three early on...all valid calls...not a problem with it...then they called Butler for one that wasn't even close. That got me a bit riled up. The palming on Diebs.....grumble, grumble...yeah, okay.
And then forget about it. The number of uncalled travels in the 2nd half was shocking, considering the way they called the first half....if you want to call the violation, call it, but dammit, you have to keep calling it! (Even if it is every single time Evan Turner makes a move with the ball. )

This is more an overall rant regarding officiating at every level. A little freaking consistency every once in awhile.

Al in all, I'll take the win every day. Hope the team can continue to make strides in the right direction. Certainly prettier than a couple weeks ago.