I had to pause it. It was too awesome of an image.
The number of the night was 6. That's how many three's John Jenkins nailed in Gainseville tonight to propel his team past the Florida Gators. The best part is, he's only a freshman! I loved how young he sounded in his interview with Jennine Edwards on ESPN after the game. It was obvious he had never done a post game interview on ESPN before in his life. But let's be real, how many 18 year olds have?
The Commodores got off to a great start early, which was really important. We didn't sustain the 13 point lead that we built up early, but it was important to keep the crowd out of the game early and avoid one of our sloppy starts. Beal and Jenkins hit 3's early and A.J. gave us a good offensive performance. Even though people give Ogilvy heat, you have to give it to the guy, his 16 points, 8 rebounds, and 4 steals are pretty typical for him. After a huge run at the end of the half by Florida, the Commodores went into halftime with a 3 point lead at 38-35. The Dores came out quickly in the beginning of hte second half but entered a drought to allow the Gators to go up as many as 5. The funniest part is that ESPN kept talking about how Florida hadn't lost when they were leading with 5 minutes remaining in the game (19-0). Once the clock ticked 5 minutes, and we were down by 1, I just had a feeling that streak was going to end, and I was right. Down the stretch, our boy Johnny Jenkins knocked down some key 3 pointers to give the Commodores the lead for good. Vandy clinched a bye in the SEC tournament and improved to 23-6 (12-3), adding another impressive road win to their already padded resume. Florida dropped to 9-6 in the SEC and put themselves in even more jeopardy of missing the NCAA Tournament for the 3rd straight year.
Two major points stood out to me: Coach Stallings is a genius for inserting Jenkins into the starting lineup, and Jermaine Beal knocking down those two free throws at the end of the game is hopefully indicative of what we're going to get in the post season. He didn't have his best game, only 13 points, but the dude stepped up with swagger and confidence and just sealed the game. That is leadership right there ladies and gentlemen, and that's what you need to win championships. I said in the Florida pregame that Stallings was hoping to get the most out of his team at this time of the year, and it's obvious that he did so tonight. Jenkins hit 6 three's for god sake!
I often wonder, why we don't get more love from the media?! ESPN talks about NCAA tournament seeding and the bubble, but they almost NEVER discuss Vanderbilt. I feel like this will end up being a good thing, as we'll fly under the radar until the media has no choice but to start talking about us.
A great Vanderbilt Commodore victory tonight, we should all be proud.
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