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Sometimes you wonder how they do it.

Sometimes you look at how they play in spurts and you wonder how they manage to stay in games at all.

Sometimes you look at how they play in spurts and you wonder how good this group can be as it shows toughness and determination beyond its years in refusing to buckle under to second half deficits.

Sometimes you wonder how a team this young can hit clutch shot after clutch shot to stay in or win games after falling behind in some cases by double digits on the road.

Welcome to the world of the Florida men's basketball team.

Yet again, this young team fell behind in an SEC road game but found a way to come back to win after edging South Carolina 73-71 to run its SEC record to 4-1. By the way, that is good for first place in the SEC East, ahead of nationally ranked Tennessee...and nationally ranked Vanderbilt...and perennial power Kentucky heading into a Sunday game with Vanderbilt.

We all know how young this Gator basketball team is and youth can sometimes be a detriment; but maybe in Florida's case, its youth is a good thing. Maybe this young team doesn't know it is supposed to fold when it goes on the road, or fold in its own building when mighty Kentucky comes back to force an overtime. It is really amazing to watch this group that hardly has enough players that shave come through with a grit and determination to succeed at such a tender time in their development.

The reality is that Florida (17-3) has played 20 games now and certain things have emerged with this team.

** Freshman Nick Calathes is all that he was advertised to be and then some; he leads the SEC in assists and is a consistent scorer as well. He may play too fast at times but he is electric with the ball in his hands as a passer or a scorer.

** Maybe the so called "soft" non-conference schedule the Gators played wasn't such a bad idea after all. That schedule allowed a young team to learn how to win as it grew and developed its idenity and it is hard to argue with the result at this stage of the game.

** The Gator coaching staff deserves a great deal of credit for molding and coaching this team. It all starts with recruiting and it is obvious that Billy Donovan and his staff recruited a group with a high basketball IQ that has quickly developed a good rapport with one another.

** Speights and Lucas are getting it. Speights has been the beast inside the last couple of games that Gator fans thought he would be at the start of the year. He has been a consistent rebounder but of late he is much more aggressive on the offensive end.

Lucas didn't look like he could shoot very well early in the year and seemed to play tentatively but lately he has dialed up his offensive game, showing a nice ability to run the team from the point while hitting some absolutely clutch shots, especially from long range, late in games.

** This team can shoot. Despite its youth, this Florida team shoots the basketball well, despite having a couple of games where it couldn't throw the ball in the water. The Gators on the year are shooting 50 percent overall and almost 40 percent from long distance. Donovan recruits kids that can shoot the rock, and the numbers show it.

As wonderful as it was to see the Joakim Noah, Corey Brewer, Al Horford bunch win back to back national titles, it also nice to see this new group of players start to carve out their own identity. They are growing up right before our eyes, warts and all, but you get a sense that Gator fans are really warming up to this team that has displayed a surprising amount of toughness and skill at such an early point in its development.

The play won't always be pretty to watch and there is no telling how much the so called "freshman wall" could affect this group down the road but for right now, isn't it just fun to watch these kids play?

After beating South Carolina, Gator head coach Billy Donovan said there is still much for his young team to learn.

"There's a lot of lessons to be learned and I'm hoping we can learn through winning and it doesn't give us a sense to be complacent and think it's easy because it is really hard to win on the road," Donovan said. " What these kids did (tonight) I was really proud of them."

Billy D should be proud of them.

And you should be too.