SAN ANTONIO — Auburn and Florida are the last two standing of a record 14 SEC teams that made the NCAA Tournament. Only one of them will get to play for the national championship.

In a Final Four filled with No. 1 seeds, the SEC regular-season champion Tigers (32-5) play the conference tournament-winning Gators in the first national semifinal game Saturday in the Alamodome. The matchup pits All-Americans Johni Broome and Walter Clayton Jr. against each other again.

“The success that the league has had in the tournament has been pretty amazing,” Gators coach Todd Golden said. “The league, obviously, (got) a lot of respect, a lot of notoriety after the non-conference. Once you get to elite play, people wonder how real it is. I believe the results we have had so far in the NCAA Tournament speak to that.”

Florida (34-4), which has won 10 in a row since the start of March, twice during the regular season beat No. 1-ranked SEC teams. The Gators first won by 30 points at Tennessee, then, a month later, had a 90-81 win at Auburn on Feb. 8 that solidified how they felt about their team.

“It just gave us confidence because we always believed that we (were) the No. 1 team after we beat them,” said Alijah Martin, the only Gators player with Final Four experience (with FAU two years ago.)

Added freshman guard Tahaad Pettiford: “They just out-toughed us that game. They did everything that we didn’t do.”

After the tournament’s first Final Four matchup of SEC teams, the winner will play for league’s first national title in men’s basketball since Kentucky in 2012.

Alex Condon, Florida’s 6-foot-11 post from Australia, had no problem being physical with Broome when the teams first played. He plans to be again.

“He’s going to be wanting to come out and prove that he’s a better player than me,” Condon said. “So I think I did a good job last time just coming out and initiating the physicality with him. And yeah, I know I’m going to be ready to go.”

Condon had 17 points and 10 rebounds in that win over the Tigers. Broome had 18 points on 8-of-19 shooting with 11 rebounds.

Broome had 25 points and 14 rebounds in the South Regional final win over Michigan State last Sunday but briefly left in the second half after his right elbow bent awkwardly during a hard fall. He grabbed several rebounds and with one arm after returning but also swooshed a 3-pointer.

Even with some kind of brace on his right elbow covered by a sleeve, the Tigers leading scorer said he had no pain and no limitations for the Final Four.

“I felt great in practice yesterday, I feel great today and I’ll be even better tomorrow,” Broome said Friday.

The only game Clayton has played every minute this season was against Auburn, four days after he missed a game while dealing with a sore ankle.

Clayton was big when the Gators had to rally twice in March Madness. He scored 13 of his 23 points in the final eight minutes in a 77-75 win in the second round that ended UConn’s pursuit of a third national title in a row, then last Sunday hit two late 3s as Florida came from nine points down with less than three minutes left to beat Texas Tech.

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