Column: Buckeyes can't avoid Gators

Thad Matta was still enjoying Ohio State's win over Georgetown when he walked courtside at the Georgia Dome to catch some of the first half of the other national semifinal between UCLA and Florida.

Sitting nearby was Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel, and Matta went over to accept congratulations from him for making the basketball championship game. The football coach told the basketball coach there was only one more game to win, then confided who he wanted to see it against.

"I'm rooting for the team in blue," Tressel said.

He meant UCLA.

Hard to blame him.

Spring football practice may already be under way at Ohio State, but the licking Tressel's Buckeyes took in the BCS championship game less than three months ago was surely still fresh in his mind.

The last thing Matta needed was to have to avenge the loss for his fellow coach against Florida's basketball team.

Especially this basketball team.

Then again, not many coaches would want to face the defending national champions after the way they dominated UCLA to get within a game of winning the title for the second straight time.

Not many coaches would want to face five returning starters who already have national championship rings.

Ben Howland did it Saturday night, confident his gritty Bruins would play hard enough to overcome an obvious talent and experience differential. It didn't go well, and now his Bruins are going home.

Matta gets the job next, and he better hope Greg Oden stays out of early foul trouble this time or things might get just as ugly as they did in Arizona in January when the Gators trounced Ohio State 41-14 for the football championship.

That's not taking anything away from Ohio State, which did what it needed to do to beat Georgetown and get to the final itself. But that was against Georgetown, a team that seemed happy just to be in the Final Four and said as much afterward.

This was the defending champs, who blew out a UCLA team that had a year to steam about its loss in last year's final and almost as long to prepare for a rematch that was supposed to be the most competitive game of this Final Four.

The Bruins were mad at Joakim Noah for blowing kisses at their cheerleaders and lying on the floor in celebration after last year's win. They were mad at themselves for not playing hard enough in the title game.

They were going to show Florida that great defense and even greater will was more than enough to overcome great talent.

What is it they say about best laid plans?

Playing with a swagger reserved for those who have done it before, the Gators didn't just embarrass UCLA once again when it mattered most. They humiliated them in a game that wasn't nearly as close as the 76-66 final score indicated.

Unfortunately for Ohio State, they're not finished yet.

"We're happy, but we're not satisfied," Noah said.

Noah led the way as usual, his bushy ponytail flapping up and down as he ran the court with a sense of urgency. But two teammates who also passed up the pros last year, Corey Brewer and Al Horford, played huge, too, and yet another returnee, Lee Humphrey, helped make the game a laugher with a string of early 3-pointers in the second half.

Their coach, who may or may not return, didn't do too badly himself, refusing to panic when his team scored only one basket in the first seven and a half minutes. Billy Donovan leads this group of confident stars with an air of a point guard who has seen it all before.

Give the referees an assist for taking UCLA star Arron Afflalo out of the game early, but it may not have made a difference.

Florida is just that good.

Donovan wasn't going to give Ohio State any bulletin board material by saying that himself, but it's clear the coach is as confident in this team as it is in itself. The team is not only loaded with talent, but is closeknit and has a variety of leaders.

That's the reason Florida is back in the title game, with a chance to become the first team to win a second straight national title since Duke in 1992.

"People don't realize that there's a lot of baggage that comes with winning it all," Donovan said. "A lot of times it's stuff you think as a player you want. But when you've got to go through it, it's not a whole lot that you want."

What the Gators want right now is another ring.

The way they played Saturday night, it's not too early start fitting them for sizes.

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Tim Dahlberg is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at [e-mail]