State College of Florida, despite loss, can reach state JUCO men's basketball tournament
BRADENTON -- Elliot Washington didn't need to look at the stat sheet to know how poorly his State College of Florida basketball team played.
Even the scoreboard, which showed the 105-95 drubbing the Manatees took from Polk State College Saturday at Hal Gymnasium didn't give an accurate picture.
The sight of the Polk players getting rebound and after rebound and scoring layup after layup was a nightmare Washington will have to live with the next few days.
Polk scored 52 points in the paint, which told SCF's second-year head coach everything he needed to know about this game.
"Our guys did not match the intensity those guys had. They are number one in our conference and wanted to come in and establish themselves early and did it," Washington said. "We didn't seem engaged. I am not really sure why. We definitely said for us to win, we had to rebound and keep them out of the paint and we didn't do that."
The Eagles (22-7, 7-1) won the Suncoast Conference regular season to get an automatic bid to the state tournament and doesn't have to play in the conference tournament.
SCF, Hillsborough Community College and St. Petersburg College will vie for the conference tournament title and a spot in the state tournament.
SCF (11-18, 2-6) plays at Hillsborough on Wednesday. If they win, the Manatees will be home next Saturday in the tournament opener, and if they lose, they will be at Hillsborough.
The winner of that game plays St. Petersburg College for a berth in the state tournament.
"The performance tonight is not something we are used to," Washington said. "I haven't talked to them but I will definitely express my disappointment with our energy and effort and not being engaged. Getting a chance to beat the number one team in the conference is an opportunity and when you get that opportunity you have to be able to step forward."
SCF lost by 12 and 13 points to Polk earlier in the season. The Eagles dominated the boards the last time they met at Polk, 56-25, with 21 offensive rebounds. This time they outrebounded SCF 20-11 on the offensive glass.
Josh Floyd and Reshard Brown led SCF with 12 points each, and Floyd dished out seven assists. The other double-figure scorers for the Manatees were Blake Harper and Daniel Duarte with 10 points each. Austin Walker, who played at Bradenton Christian and then Sarasota Riverview, scored nine points and led SCF with seven rebounds. The Manatees connected on 26 of 69 shots (38 percent) and were 7-26 from beyond the arc.
"We still have a chance (to go to the state tournament). We have to go to Hillsborough and beat them at their place and we've beaten them already before. Then we get a home game on Saturday," Washington said. "We live to fight another day, but time is running out. You're not going to continue to get opportunities. We've done a lot of good things this season and will get back to work Monday and try to figure out how to get better."
SCF has a few things to feel confident about. The Manatees beat St. Petersburg and Hillsborough in back to back games less than two weeks ago.
"We have brought in enough talent. You've got to mold those guys into one accord and you are going to have some left turns and hiccups here and there," Washington said. "We just got to go out each day and try to move forward. Playing with enough energy and focus on every possession is important. You can't take one, two or three plays off at this level. Florida JUCO is rated the number one JUCO competition in the country. A lot of people from Manatee and Sarasota County don't know that."
Alan Dell, Herald sports columnist/writer, can be reached at 941-745-7056. Follow him on Twitter @ADellSports
This story was originally published February 13, 2016 at 12:00 AM with the headline "State College of Florida, despite loss, can reach state JUCO men's basketball tournament ."