Early barrage enables Tide to withstand rally

ATLANTA | For 16 minutes, the University of Alabama basketball team looked like it was serious about playing its way into the Final Four.

The intensity waned after that, but a lightning-fast start was still enough for the Crimson Tide to eliminate defending national champion Florida with an 80-69 win in the first round of the Southeastern Conference Tournament.

Powered by the inside-outside combination of Richard Hendrix and Mykal Riley, Alabama roared to a 42-14 lead in the first 16 minutes, then weathered a big Florida run in the second half to advance. The Tide will face SEC West champion Mississippi State in the second round at 6:30 p.m. today.

The Tide started the game on a 14-0 run.

Florida managed to pull as close as six points, 57-51, with nine minutes to play but Alabama regained its poise and outscored the Gators 23-18 over the rest of the game to win with relative comfort.

Riley and Hendrix again had the key roles in righting the ship, with Hendrix contributing a critical blocked shot and Riley adding two crucial 3-point shots down the stretch.

Riley made 8 of 12 3-pointers in the game. The eight 3-pointers ties the UA school record and also equals the SEC Tournament record held by four others, including former Tide star Earnest Shelton.

'We knew going in that it was key for us to slow them down at the 3-point line,' Florida coach Billy Donovan said. 'Riley didn't shoot that well against us in the first game in Tuscaloosa, but we knew he was coming off a great game against Vanderbilt. With his shooting and Hendrix, we really didn't have an answer for it.'

'We didn't come ready to play,' said Florida freshman forward Chandler Parsons. 'Taking nothing away from Alabama, we just didn't play defense at all. It should never happen that we allow ourselves to get down that far. All we could do after that was try to come back the best we could, six or eight points at a time. There are no 20-point shots. And against high Division I competition, like an SEC team, that's too big a margin.'

Still, Florida (21-11) did make a strong second-half run to cut a 55-30 Alabama lead down to 57-51 over an eight-minute span.

'We got on 55 and we seemed to be stuck there for a long time.' Tide head coach Mark Gottfried said. 'When you get a big lead like that, it can out you in a little bit of a tricky situation sometimes because you want to stay sharp but you don't want to rip up and down and take quick shots.

'I thought the 3-pointer that Mykal hit at that point [to put Alabama back ahead 60-51] was huge. It put some oxygen back in the tank for us.'

Florida's last best hope came with just over six minutes remaining. The Gators trailed by seven and Parsons appeared on his way to an easy layup that would have cut the deficit to five points. Instead, Hendrix extended for a crucial block, triggering a fast break that ended in a Riley 3-pointer — and a 10-point Tide lead.

'I thought Alabama really made some momentum changing plays and that was the biggest one,' Donovan said.

'We just had to quit playing not to lose and start playing to win,' said Hendrix, who had 22 points and eight rebounds.

The Crimson Tide (17-15) helped Florida keep back with shaky second-half foul shooting. UA missed eight of its first 11 free throws in the half before hitting nine of its last 12 to hang on down the stretch.

Riley finished with 26 points to lead all scorers. Alonzo Gee added 13 for UA.

Marreese Speights led Florida with 15 points.

Mississippi State, the Tide's opponent today, defeated Alabama twice in the regular season. The Bulldogs won 66-56 in Tuscaloosa and 73-66 in Starkville in the earlier meetings.

Reach Cecil Hurt at cecil.hurt@tuscaloosanews.com or at 205-722-0225.