Defending national champion Florida clinched a share of the SEC men's basketball regular-season title witha 111-77 demolitionof Arkansas on Saturday night.
The 34-point loss for Arkansas ties the worst defeat in head coach John Calipari's career. While at Kentucky, the Wildcats lost to Duke, 118-84, to open the 2018-19 season. For the Razorbacks, the margin is the worst SEC loss in program history, topping the 73-45 defeat to the Gators during the 2010-11 campaign.
"I wish it would have gone faster,"Calipari saidin his postgame press conference.
Tensions flared early in the second half between Calipari and Florida coach Todd Golden as the two coaches yelled at each other on the sideline and both drew technical fouls. Following the game, neither one of them elaborated on what was said during the exchange.
"Who knows? We're both competitors,"Calipari said. "He's done a great job. I can tell you, he out-coached me today."
"The tech, both of us were just coaching our team,"said Golden. "He's obviously a Hall of Fame coach, an incredible coach and we're just out there competing. I don't think either of us thought twice about it after it happened, but it was a little bit part of the game tonight."
The Gators improved to 14-2 in the SEC (23-6 overall), which gives them a two-game lead over Alabama with two games remaining on the regular-season schedule. Florida closes out the season by hosting Mississippi State (13-16, 5-11 SEC) and visiting Kentucky (19-10, 10-6). A win in one of those two games will clinch the conference title.
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Alabama faces Georgia (20-9, 8-8) on the road and Auburn (15-14, 6-10) at home in its final two games.
Thomas Haugh led Florida with 22 points and five rebounds, while Alex Condon added 17 points with six assists, and Rueben Chinyelu grabbed 16 rebounds. The Gators have won nine consecutive games and 18 of their past 20 since losing two in a row to No. 1 Duke and No. 6 UConn in early December.
"We're playing really good basketball right now,"Golden said afterwards. "I think we're getting contributions from a number of guys. I think that's probably allowed us to become an even better team."
"Didn't lose in February," he added later. "Got to try not to lose in March either."
With a 109-74 lead late with under a minute remaining, Golden thrilled the home fans by putting 7-foot-9 center Olivier Rioux in the game.
The Razorbacks were led by Billy Richmond III's 22 points and six rebounds. Darius Acuff Jr. added 17 points and six assists. Arkansas dropped to 21-8 overall, but still holds third place in the SEC at 11-5.
Calipari later joked that he must have suffered worse defeats when he began his head coaching career.
"Wait a minute. My first year at UMass, I had to have some of these," he said. "We gave up 100 more than any other team in the country that year."
The SEC men's basketball tournament begins March 11. The top four seeds receive byes through the first two rounds into the quarterfinals.