Florida Men’s Hoops Defeats Texas A&M

The Florida men’s basketball team improves to 13-2 on the season after blowing out Texas A&M 68-47 Thursday night in College Station.  Florida moves to 3-0 in SEC play while A&M falls to 12-4 and 2-1 in the conference.

Florida shot the ball well at 50 percent on 25 of 50 shooting and the Gators also hit 35 percent from beyond the arc while making 11 of their 13 free throws.

The Aggies however weren’t as efficient, going 17-50 from the floor, 30 percent from the arc and making only 71 percent of their free throws.  A&M out rebounded the Gators 29-26 but failed to protect the ball, turning it over 16 times to Florida’s ten.  Florida not only recorded 16 assists to the Aggies nine but also outscored them in both halves.

The Gators had three players scoring in double figures led by senior guard Mike Rosario with 19 points while junior center Patric Young finished the night with 18 points, going seven of nine from the floor, adding seven rebounds and three steals. Senior forward Erik Murphy had 16 points on six of ten shooting, 40 percent from three point land while grabbing seven boards.

Senior guard Kenny Boynton had another difficult night shooting, only making two of his six shots from the field; but while only scoring five points, he was able to dish out five assists, grab two boards and make two steals to help the Gator cause.

Defensively, guard Scottie Wilbekin and his teammates held Aggie leading scorer Elston Turner to just four points on one of ten shooting.

For the Aggies, freshman guard Alex Caruso came off the bench to lead them in scoring with 12 points.  Freshman guard J’Mychal Reese followed with ten points while senior forward Ray Turner led the team in rebounding with eight to go along with eight points.

The No. 10 Gators next game will be this Saturday at home against the No. 17 Missouri Tigers.  You can hear the game live on ESPN Radio 850/900 and Country 103-7 The Gator starting at 1:25pm.