Todd Golden explaining Iowa's game-winner leaves Florida fans scratching their heads

It is March Madness, alright... While the Florida Gators had serious aspirations about defending their national title, it all went kaputt vs. the Iowa Hawkeyes in the final seconds of their Round of 32 game. A questionable decision to press an Iowa team that moves like a tortoise backfired on Todd Golden massively. This set up a game-winner from Alvaro Folgueiras from distance off a Bennett Stirtz dime.

After the game, Golden reflected on what occurred in this critical rendition of game theory gone awry.

"Disappointing result for us tonight. [We] did a poor job of executing."

The plan all along was for the Florida defense was to foul an 84-percent free-throw shooter in Stirtz.

For the sake of argument, let's try to do some math to explain Golden's logic. Florida was up two points with seconds left. If Florida did foul Stirtz, the chances of him missing one of the two free throws was roughly 30 percent. While Florida made 50 percent of its shots in the game, let's drop it down to 45 percent for the sake of pressure. Golden's plan would have worked 75 percent of the time.

Instead, Iowa had roughly a 33-percent chance for Folgueiras to make the game-winning 3-pointer...

Florida fans have all offseason to mull over Todd Golden's Iowa decision

Yes, the math was in Golden's favor to come out on top, but he did not do a good job of relaying that to his players. To put it in perspective, Florida winning Golden's way would have given them roughly a 75-percent chance at the win, based on either a missed Stirtz free throw, or a made Florida bucket in transition. By not fouling and not defending in transition, Florida's odds of winning were at 66 percent.

It is not that simple, but it does paint a picture of what the percentages of any sort of outcome could have looked like. The nine-percent advantage Golden thought he had was all for naught. In the end, the perceived best head coach in the SEC lost the plot just a bit during the final seconds. He went up against a worthy adversary in Ben McCollum and got beat. It was a recurring theme during the game.

Perhaps there is a lesson to be learned heading into next year from the Iowa game for Golden and his program. Iowa playing at a lethargic pace may not create a fun watch, but it does have McCollum's players locked in on every possession. In a game defined by pace-and-space, this can run counter to it effectively. Florida played out of its comfort zone all night vs. Iowa and paid the ultimate price for it.

To attempt to tie a bow on this, Florida may have had the better athletes over Iowa, but it did not have the better team. Florida's on-court leadership was brought into question. Thomas Haugh did not play well again. Rueben Chinyelu played the worst game of his life. Had either played their part in this one, Florida would not have been in this situation. It would not have had Golden put in such a difficult spot.

The whole situation was confusing because Florida did not take Iowa as seriously as it should have...