By MARK LONG
Associated Press

(JACKSONVILLE, Fla., AP) — The most surprising women’s basketball team in the Southeastern Conference might not be perennial powerhouse Tennessee.

No. 25 Florida was picked to finish 12th in the league in the preseason, hardly a huge slight at the time considering the Gators went 13-17 last season and fired two assistant coaches.

But Florida responded with arguably the best season in coach Amanda Butler’s nine years. The Gators (22-7, 10-6 SEC) won three of their final four regular-season games and earned the No. 4 seed and a double bye in the SEC Tournament, which begins Wednesday in Jacksonville.

With all the attention on top-seeded and third-ranked South Carolina and the slumping Lady Vols, who are trying to avoid missing the NCAA Tournament for the first time since its inception in 1982, under-the-radar Florida might just be the league’s postseason sleeper.

“We came with the mentality that we knew what we wanted to be,” said junior forward Ronni Williams, one of eight upperclassmen on Florida’s roster. “Last year we felt what it was like to lose and we didn’t want to be in that predicament again. It’s been effort and hard work, working together, playing together regardless of what happens. We’re playing these games for each other. We stick together and we’re a family through it all.”

Florida’s family looked like it might be broken up after last season.

Butler’s team missed the NCAA Tournament for the fourth time in six years and had few, if any, excuses for finishing below .500 for the first time since 2010.

But athletic director Jeremy Foley gave Butler another chance at her alma mater, and the Gators delivered one of their best seasons in nearly two decades. New assistants Shimmy Gray-Miller and Bill Ferrara brought fresh ideas, and key returners Williams, Haley Lorenzen, January Miller, Cassie Peoples and Carlie Needles bought in.

The key may have been a late-developing recruiting class that included Eleanna Christinaki, a member of Greece’s senior national team the last three years, and junior college transfer Simone Westbrook.

Christinaki ranks second on the team in scoring (10.5 points a game) and first in assists (101), while Westbrook is fifth in scoring (8.1) and leads the team in steals (65).

Throw in the team’s “power of touch” philosophy — which doles out points for high-fives, chest-bumps, pats on the back and picking up teammates in games and practices — and the Gators seemingly have something special going on right now.

“You can overcome a lot with culture,” Lorenzen said. “You can overcome 26 turnovers with culture. You can overcome a rebounding deficit by playing for one another and hustling for every single ball. Our culture is the biggest thing that defines us from anyone else.”