{"id":130955,"date":"2026-01-25T03:26:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-25T03:26:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/130955\/"},"modified":"2026-01-25T03:26:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-25T03:26:07","slug":"floridas-second-half-rally-falls-short-in-upset-loss-against-auburn-wruf-98-1-fm-850-am","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/130955\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida\u2019s Second-Half Rally Falls Short in Upset Loss Against Auburn – WRUF 98.1 FM | 850 AM"},"content":{"rendered":"

Saturday\u2019s Florida men\u2019s basketball 76-67\u00a0loss can be described in one word: surprising. Whether it was the No. 16 Gators being outrebounded 20-13 in the first half or new football coach Jon Sumrall<\/a> watching the game from the student section, it was tough to predict anything.<\/p>\n

Auburn (13-7, 4-3 SEC) snapped the Gators\u2019 (14-6, 5-2) five-game winning streak in notching their first victory in Gainesville since 1996. <\/p>\n

Florida\u2019s SEC foe started the game on a 19-2 run, headlined by senior Keyshawn Hall. The forward logged 22 of his team-high 24 points in the first half, including all 10 of Auburn\u2019s initial tallies.<\/p>\n

The reigning national champion Gators, an 11 1\/2-point favorite, were down by 15 points at the half (43-28), but stormed back two minutes into the final 20 minutes.<\/p>\n

They cut Auburn\u2019s lead to seven thanks to an Urban Klavzar 3 and a Thomas Haugh transition layup on the succeeding possession.<\/p>\n

Florida\u2019s 26-10 streak was capped halfway through the second half. The Gators failed to hold the lead for more than 56 seconds, and did not do so after 1:30 into the contest.<\/p>\n

Rebound, rebound, rebound. A mantra that Florida has carried with it throughout the season. That idea stalled Saturday. Auburn\u2019s KeShawn Murphy\u2019s four rebounds at the break exceeded each Gator\u2019s total in that span.<\/p>\n

Florida ultimately outrebounded Auburn 39-32, but was kept to just 13 in the first half.<\/p>\n

The Tigers\u2019 victory comes nearly 11 months after the last matchup between the programs. Florida topped Auburn 79-73 in last season\u2019s Final Four. The Gators would win their third NCAA title two days later.<\/p>\n

Saturday was a different story. Florida failed to generate any semblance of offense in the first 20 minutes of play. It shot 38% from the field to Auburn\u2019s 48%.<\/p>\n

The loss was the first contest in which Florida was outscored in the paint since Dec. 2 against Duke. The Tigers picked up 38 points down low compared to the Gators\u2019 28.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis team is known for its grittiness and getting those paint buckets,\u201d UF\u2019s Thomas Haugh said. \u201cAs a frontcourt, we can\u2019t let that happen.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Florida shot 26% (7-for-27 ) from beyond the arc, including Haugh going 3-for-9. The junior forward led all scorers with 27 points.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Haugh amassed his fourth triple-double of the season after picking up a team-high 10 rebounds.<\/p>\n

Lack of success from the charity stripe can be honed in on after Florida\u2019s nine-point loss. The group went 59% from the line (16 of 27). The Tigers knocked down 19-of-21 from the line<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s unacceptable,\u201d Rueben Chinyelu said. \u201cIt\u2019s called \u2018free\u2019 for a reason.\u201d<\/p>\n

A main component of the Gators\u2019 previous success was Chinyelu<\/a>, who was kept to just two boards in the first half.<\/p>\n

The junior is the reigning SEC Player of the Week and USBWA Oscar Robertson National Player of the Week. The accolades came as the center picked up four consecutive double-doubles heading into Saturday. Chinyelu was held to his lowest point total (10) since Jan. 3 against Missouri.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe pride ourselves on being a mentally and physically tough team. I don\u2019t think we were either of those tonight,\u201d Gators coach Todd Golden said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Category: Feature Sports News<\/a>, Gators Men’s Basketball<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Saturday\u2019s Florida men\u2019s basketball 76-67\u00a0loss can be described in one word: surprising. Whether it was the No. 16…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130956,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2534,28,30,3110,29,52372,62,3115,3116],"class_list":["post-130955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-auburn-tigers","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-mens-basketball","tag-florida-news","tag-reuben-chinyelu","tag-sec","tag-thomas-haugh","tag-todd-golden"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130955"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130955\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}