Under the Radar Game of the Day: Florida Gulf Coast at North Florida

Florida Gulf Coast at North Florida, 7:00 PM Eastern, espn3

The Atlantic Sun Conference is front and center tonight as two of the three teams currently tied for first place in the conference standings meet in Jacksonville, Florida.  Florida Gulf Coast enters play tonight at 4-1 in A-Sun play and 15-6 overall.  The Eagles looked like they had a chance to dominate this conference after jumping out to a 3-0 league start with three consecutive road wins, before they suffered a somewhat shocking home loss last week to South Carolina-Upstate (the third team tied at 4-1 entering play tonight).  FGCU’s power ratings are still by far the best in the conference.  Junior Brandon Goodwin has led the team offensively, including seven games already this year in which he has topped the 20 point mark.  Containing him is they key to defeating the Eagles, as Upstate did last week when they held him to 12 points and only 2 assists (versus 4 turnovers).

North Florida was supposed to contend for the A-Sun title this season but ended up disappointing us during the non-conference part of the year, resulting in only a 9-13 overall record.  4 of those wins were against non-D1 opponents, meaning the Ospreys only have one D1 win (by 1 point over North Dakota on a neutral court) against non-Atlantic Sun teams.  The Ospreys have looked much better since conference play began, including having picked up a win at USC-Upstate.  Senior Dallas Moore seems to be putting this team on his back, as he has averaged almost 32 points in his team’s last three games.  With the offensive talent on the floor tonight, and the great battle looming between Brandon Goodwin and Dallas Moore, this game has a chance to be a ton of fun.  If the Ospreys can protect their home court and capture the win, they have a chance to prove that the non-conference struggles were meaningless in the battle for the Atlantic Sun regular season title and a chance for home court advantage in the conference tournament.