In an effort to provide an additional perspective on the three-seed Florida Gators 78-64 victory over the Minnesota Golden Gophers this past Sunday, OGGOA reached out to former Florida team manager Kyle Gilreath, who now works for Fast Model Sports and runs an interesting basketball blog Words on the Bounce. Gilreath diagrammed two plays that worked quite well for the Gators against the Gophers on Sunday during the 2013 NCAA Tournament and outlined the situations below. (Next season, OGGOA hopes to have video to accompany similar features.)

Gap: Florida ran this zone offense action several times in the first half and ended up with wide open three-pointers nearly every time head coach Billy Donovan called the play. The Gators start with three guards around the perimeter and two big men along the baseline behind the zone. Junior point guard Scottie Wilbekin offsets the ball with a dribble and post as the option to flash to the mid-post area. On the catch, junior center Patric Young had three options: (1) attack the rim, (2) look for senior forward Erik Murphy with a high-low pass if he seals X4, or (3) kick it out for an open three-pointer if the zone packs in to prevent the easy layup.

15 Spread: Florida was badly hurting Minnesota with its pick-and-roll / pick-and-pop, so Gophers head coach Tubby Smith decided to start switching all ball screens in the second half. Once this happened, Donovan responded by spreading the floor and took advantage of Minnesota’s strategy. With four players outside of the perimeter, Young sprinted into a middle pick-and-roll. The Gophers switched, which led to a mismatch not only inside with Young but this also left a big man guarding Wilbekin up top. This gave the Gators two options which they went to down the stretch: (1) Wilbekin attacked the big one-on-one to get to the rim (if the defense helped on the penetration, he found Young inside or shooters spotting up in the corner) and (2) Wilbekin also threw back to the other ball-side guard who would then look to feed Young down low.

And then, of course, Wilbekin and junior F Casey Prather also connected on their second alley-oop in as many games. While Gainesville, FL may not be “Dunk City,” Wilbekin and Murphy have put up their share of highlights this season including a half-court alley-oop in Florida’s second-round take down of Northwestern State.

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