Brad Stevens is still bitter about losing to Al Horford’s Florida Gators 10 years ago
The Celtics head coach won't let go of a foul call that went Horford's way.
After transitioning from a coaching at the Butler to the NBA in 2013, Brad Stevens is no longer directly involved with NCAA March Madness. However, that didn’t stop the Celtics head coach from showing plenty of fire on the day before the 10-year anniversary of his Bulldogs facing off with Al Horford’s Florida Gators.
The top-seeded Gators ultimately came out on top in the Sweet 16 matchup with the fifth-seeded Bulldogs in 2007, but that victory is tainted in Stevens’ mind due to a controversial foul that went Florida’s way during crunch time.
“Al Horford charged,” Stevens said of the play Wednesday. “He charged. I sent (video of the play) to him when we first signed him.”
Stevens was just an assistant coach with Butler in 2007, but he remembered all the details of the sequence with impressive precision.
“We had a one-point lead with three minutes to go,” Stevens explained. “We had a doctor and a dentist guarding Horford and [Joakim] Noah, which was not ideal. Horford took one of our undersized fours – probably an undersized three – who is now an assistant at Butler, and took him from the 3-point line to the basket and got an and-one. And it was a charge. It doesn’t still irk me or anything.”
https://youtu.be/t-Fon63lHw8?t=1h3m45s
Horford remembers things a little bit differently.
“I think that when you look back at the game and you’re the team that lost, you’re always going to find excuses and ways to try to (explain) something,” Horford said. “But hey, it was an and-one call, it was a big play and we put them away. They were a good team, they were a tough team. They played us hard all the way.”
The sequence was the turning point in Florida’s eventual 65-57 victory, ensuring that Horford will never stop hearing about it while he’s being coached by Stevens in Boston.
“He’s brought it up about three times so I think it still lingers in his mind,” he said. “It was one of those games that I will never forget just because it was a Sweet 16 game, very intense. I feel like they played us better than anybody did that year in the tournament. Gotta give the coaches a lot of credit because they had their guys ready to go.”
Florida ultimately went on to win the national championship in 2007 while Stevens took over as Butler’s head coach the following season.
