Todd Golden provides injury update on Micah Handlogten after scary fall in SEC Championship game

Florida center Micah Handlogten suffered a fractured lower left leg when he fell awkwardly during the first half of the Gators’ SEC Tournament Championship game against Auburn, according to head coach Todd Golden.

Handlogten’s left leg appeared to suffer some sort of break after going up for a rebound upon replay, and was put in an air cast and taken off the court in a stretcher. Golden confirmed the news to ESPN sideline reporter Marty Smith during halftime.

“As [Golden] exited the locker room, he did confirm for me that Micah Handlogten fractured his lower left leg. He is at Vanderbilt for further evaluation,” Smith said on the ESPN broadcast. “Coach Golden told me that he’s really proud of his team for the way that they emotionally rebounded, especially in the second 10 minutes of that first half after seeing their brother go down and to get right back in this game down eight with 20 to go.”

During Smith’s initial report after Handlogten was stretchered off, he did revealed that he “saw some blood,” on the court near where Handlogten fell down, which suggests it belongs to the Florida big man.

Handlogten ultimately left the game within the first four minutes. His parents were on the court with him as he was being tended to be medical personnel on site, and his teammates came over to give him well wishes before he was sent to Vanderbilt.

Auburn took a 38-30 lead into the break, but the Gators started off the second half on a hot streak and cut the lead down to as many as one within the first five minutes. Auburn would keep the lead, however, stretching it back to double digits with a 17-2 over the next five-minute stretch.

Losing Handlogten has proven tough for the Gators, however. Unable to protect the rim as well as normal without his 7-foot-1 frame, Auburn exploited this and managed to rattle off 36 points in the paint during the first 30 minutes of regulation.

With Auburn jumping out to a massive lead in the second half, a loss for the Gators in the SEC Tournament final could cost them a seed in the NCAA Tournament, as ESPN’s Joe Lunardi explained before tip. Lunardi believes there is a case to be made from Florida and South Carolina to flip based on the championship game’s outcome, with the Gamecocks taking a 5-seed with a Florida loss, while the Gators would be a projected 6-seed.