Photo credit: gostanford.com

By Daniel Dullum
Sports Radio Service
Thursday, Nov. 22, 2018

Florida hammered Stanford 72-49 Thursday in the consolation round of the Battle 4 Atlantis tournament at Imperial Arena in Paradise Island, Bahamas.

Stanford will play Middle Tennessee in the seventh-place game at 7 p.m. on Friday. Middle Tennessee suffered an 84-53 loss to Butler.

Cormac Ryan 12 points on 4 of 9 3-pointers to lead the Cardinal (2-3) as their only double-figure scorer. Josh Sharma and Bryce Willis scored six points each, followed by KZ Okpala and Marcus Sheffield with five points each as Stanford struggled offensively all day.

Sharma was Stanford’s top rebounder with five.

Deaundrae Ballard popped in a career-high 19 points to lead the Gators (3-2), followed by KeVaughn Allen with 13 points and 11 by Noah Locke, as Florida rebounded from an opening-round loss to Oklahoma.

Kevarrius Hayes led the Gators with eight rebounds and Keyontae Johnson was next with seven.

The Gators shot 52 percent against Stanford, including 7 of 15 from 3-point range. Florida held a 32-13 halftime lead after holding the Cardinal to 5 of 23 field goal shooting and forcing 13 turnovers in the opening 20 minutes.