Florida Gators level Prairie View A&M in first round of the NCAA Tournament

Somewhere, buried deep in the 45-6 run Florida rode into the end of the opening half of its first round game, a plea tried to escape Benchmark International Arena. Or maybe it was a prayer.

“We need some help from the Lord,” said No. 16 seed Prairie View A&M’s coach, Byron Smith. “They’re good.”

God, apparently, was busy elsewhere. Perhaps center Rueben Chinyelu, Florida’s rebounding monster that had already gobbled up nine of his 13 in the first half, boxed them out. No matter the reason, help never came.

No. 1 Florida entered the break ahead 60-21 after the pair were tied at 15, which was probably the most representative snapshot of the domination Tampa witnessed Friday night. The final score, a slightly kinder 114-55, arrived around midnight, with the vast majority of the Benchmark still packed. The Gators — their fans included — needed a bit of reassurance after a spin out in the SEC semifinals a week ago. This late-night schlacking provided just that, earning a Sunday meeting with No. 9 Iowa at (7:10 EST, TBS) in the Round of 32.

“Our biggest issue in Nashville was just ball security more than anything else,” Florida coach Todd Golden said. The Gators only had seven turnovers, two fewer than in the first half against Vanderbilt a week ago. “We did a really good job of limiting our turnovers and playing together and just making the simple plays.”

And, simply put, Florida outperformed the Panthers by, literally, every statistical measurement. Thirty minutes down, the Gators had 38 points in the paint to Prairie View’s 0. Chinyelu led a frontcourt that outrebounded its opponent by 34, and the Panthers hadn’t even grabbed 10 until Florida’d emptied its bench. The Gators had 84 with 10 minutes left and 98 with five.

They even shot 45% from three after a weekend in Nashville in which they reverted to their early-season shell, bombing in 21.6%. Whether that holds into Sunday is a different, far-from-mind question the Gators might not like the answer to. But that might be the point. Florida may have taken nothing from such a beatdown.

This year, No. 1 seeds beat their opponents by an average of 30. Albeit, Florida did so by 59. The rest of the band outscored theirs by 61 … combined. However, college basketball has never featured a greater disparity between the haves and the have-nots, largely due to the transfer portal, which allows powerhouses like Florida to snatch mid-major stars with such swiftness that the sport has yet to take preventative action. The Gators’ rendition, Xaivian Lee by way of Princeton, had 10 Friday. He was Florida’s sixth-leading scorer.

“We were just locked in,” Lee said. “We had something to prove, so it was good to get this done.”

So if nothing else, this was a test of mental fortitude. Golden said earlier in the week he thought there was a limited chance the Gators fell on Friday — a mindset that doomed the sport’s most memorable NCAA Tournament jesters. Yet Florida showed no semblance of complacency.

Also of value, in a tournament setting where teams play games in such close succession, Florida’s starters essentially sat for the entirety of the final quarter of their first-round bout. The Gators’ bench tallied a whopping 47 points. Unlike Florida’s eight-point escape in the opening game of the SEC Tournament against Kentucky, which preceded the Vandy drag, the rest could prove vital Sunday.

“It helped a lot,” Florida’s star forward Thomas Haugh said. “It’s huge to be able to be well-conditioned.”

The Gators might be mind-linked.

“We’re in a really good spot going into Sunday from a health and from a freshness standpoint,” Golden said. Why: “Our guys did a great job of staying mentally focused even when we got a big lead.”

Which is how one ends up with the largest blowout a No. 1 seed has ever leveled to a No. 16 in tournament history. It was a release of anger. And when obscured by this type of evening, it can be hard to see what, if anything, can be gleaned. It can also be hard to hear the pleas.

So Prairie View drifted into the night, and Tampa glowed for the Gators. Yet there still will be more, a day later. Around then, Florida will be asked to prove how much it’s truly learned over the past few weeks. Friday’s result, if used correctly, could be a study session.

But it may have just been an irreflective pummeling.

This story was originally published March 21, 2026 at 7:37 AM.