Opponents are never going to look at those fearsome Florida Gators the same way.
Amid all the talk Thursday about how they match up with Butler and the pressure to defend their title, Corey Brewer and Taurean Green revealed a little personal information: They each have teddy bears.
Not only that, they dress the stuffed animals up and let them watch TV. Brewer even takes his bear on the road.
“It’s good luck,” Green said.
Green said he got his bear, Bubba, from a friend. Brewer’s came from his girlfriend, and he named it Pudding after his late uncle, Carl Brewer.
“He died when I was a little kid. We were real close,” Brewer said. “So it was named after him. His (nickname) was Pudding.” Brewer and Green are the key to Florida’s offense, and a big reason the Gators could be the first team to repeat as national champions since Duke in 1992. They fluster opponents, and are fierce competitors.
When it comes to their bears, though, the two are big, ol’ softies.
Brewer and Green, who share an apartment with Al Horford and Joakim Noah, have a gameday ritual for their bears. Brewer puts his in a Spider-man outfit, while Green’s sports orange boxers. Before they leave for the arena, Brewer and Green will sit the bears in a chair and turn the TV on so the bears can watch the game.
Doting on stuffed animals might be an endless source of amusement on some teams. For the laid-back Gators, though, it’s nothing out of the ordinary.
“Something is not right about it,” center Chris Richards said.
“But I respect it.”
Standing tall
Oregon guard Tajuan Porter figures he got shortchanged somewhere along the way.
His father, Alan, is more than 6-feet tall. So are his two brothers. Heck, even twin sister Teneea is “a couple centimeters” taller.
But long before the 5-foot-6 freshman was making 3-pointers and leading the Ducks to the round of 16, he was trying to match up with his sister on a Fisher Price basketball hoop set up in the family’s living room in Detroit.
“We didn’t have any furniture in there,” Porter said. “She used to beat me, a couple times, because she was bigger than me.
She used to back me down and put the ball in the rim. But as I got older, my game started to develop, I was able to beat her.”
