Donovan needs to put dancing shoes on shelf

By TIM DAHLBERG of The Associated Press

Published Tuesday, April 3, 2007

ATLANTA - Joakim Noah was dancing on the stage, busting a few moves after he and his teammates won a second straight national title. Hard to blame him, because it was surely his last dance at Florida before moving on to the NBA.

Billy Donovan wasn’t about to show his moves. But that didn’t stop him from doing a bit of dancing of his own.

He practiced it all week, deflecting questions about his future while preparing the Gators to defend their national title. Now the nets were down, the celebration was over, and inquiring people wanted to know.

So, Coach, how about those rumors you’re going to leave the place where you just made history to chase a few extra dollars at Kentucky?

Is it true that the minute Noah, Corey Brewer and Al Horford walk out the door, you’re gone, too?

"I just got off the court. I’m going to enjoy this moment right now," Donovan said. "I think all that stuff will be addressed but, you know, now is not the time to address it.

"It’s all about these kids, our program, what just happened."

It certainly should be. These Gators and their coach had every right to party all night after dismantling Greg Oden and Ohio State and doing what many thought was impossible in today’s world of one-and-out freshmen and limited scholarships to become the first team in 15 years to win back-to-back national titles.

And party they would, oblivious of the fact that Gator fans might wake up with a bit of an anxious hangover because Donovan won’t give them some peace of mind to go along with a second straight title.

What they need to understand is that not all the games are played on the court. And sometimes the score is kept using dollars - millions of them in Donovan’s case.

He’s basketball’s hottest coach, this onetime pudgy point guard who became Billy The Kid when he led Providence to a Final Four. And though he’s quite well-paid at Florida, with two years at $1.7 million per season still on his contract, there are certain perks that come with winning national championships.

One of them, according to the secret code of the coaching fraternity, is that you are allowed to play coy while fans squirm if it pays off for you in the end with either a better job or a hugely renegotiated contract.

Donovan will get what is due him, and the guess here is that Florida fans have nothing to worry about. He created something for Gator fans to follow this time of year other than spring football, and they came by the thousands to the Georgia Dome to see their team win again.

Though Kentucky seems almost desperate to land Donovan, and he will no doubt entertain an offer, he has deep roots in Gainesville after 11 years and deep loyalty to Foley. It was the athletic director who kept faith in him when the team got booted in the first and second rounds of the NCAA Tournament for five straight years beginning in 2001.

Donovan talked in the early morning hours today about how he may not have enjoyed the first championship enough, mostly because he was busy trying to figure out ways to prepare his five returning starters for the rigors of having to try and repeat.

This time, he vowed, he would let it sink in and savor the moment.

Donovan can do better than that. He can allow Florida fans to savor the moment even more.

All he needs to do is stop dancing around.