It’s been dubbed the Florida Invitational. Slated to play in a relatively unimposing bracket, the defending champion Florida Gators have been all but gifted a spot in the Final Four in this year’s NCAA Tournament. An already lightweight Midwest Region bracket took another step down the difficulty scale last weekend when second-seeded Wisconsin and fourth-seeded Maryland both were upset.

Nonetheless, when the top-seeded Gators take the floor against No. 5 Butler tonight at the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis, I think fans will be surprised at how much the game has to offer. And not just because they’ll get to see Joakim Noah’s dunk-and-scream routine or watch him re-enact his goofy dance after the SEC Championship game.

For starters, the relatively anonymous Bulldogs are much better than you think. I said a week ago that whether it was Butler or Maryland they played, this opponent would be the toughest obstacle on Florida’s road back to the Final Four, and I stand by it. While the game looks like looks like a mismatch in terms of talent, the Bulldogs’ playing style is exactly the right elixir to provide a close contest.

This style seems to be especially effective against teams that aren’t familiar with them. Butler lost four times in its own not terribly competitive conference, the Horizon League, and had a fifth loss in its annual game against nearby foe Indiana State.

But the teams that don’t play the Bulldogs regularly had great difficulty adjusting. Butler rolled past four tournament teams — Notre Dame, Indiana, Tennessee, Gonzaga — to win the NIT Season Tip-Off at Madison Square Garden in November and used a similar formula to beat Old Dominion and Maryland in the first two rounds of the NCAAs.

In this case, their game is almost perfectly suited to slay a Goliath like Florida. The Gators are at their most devastating in the open court, where fleet finishers like Noah, Al Horford, and Corey Brewer soar for dunks or spot-up shooters like Taurean Green and Lee Humphrey find open 3-point looks.

Unfortunately, they may not get a chance to do much running against Butler, because easy buckets off turnovers should be few and far between. Thanks to the savvy backcourt of 6-foot-1-inch juniors A.J. Graves and Mike Green, the Bulldogs committed only 9.5 turnovers a game — the lowest among the nation’s 325 Division 1 schools.

But an even bigger weapon is pace. Butler plays at a frustratingly slow tempo, as if Jeff Van Gundy’s more uptight cousin had been put in control of the team. That’s the reason it gave up just 56.9 points a game on the season, the fifth-best in the country, despite not suiting up anyone taller than 6-foot-7.

Offensively, Butler’s game also fits the Cinderella slipper. They’re not going to be able to score in the paint against the likes of Horford and Noah, but they don’t need to because their offense is predicated on the 3-pointer. So dependent are the Bulldogs on the longball that Green and big man Brian Ligon are the only key players who take more than half their shots from inside the arc. Thus, look for longrange shooting forwards like Pete Campbell and Brandon Crone will try to pull Horford and Noah into terra incognita away from the basket.

The ‘Dogs make their foul shots, too — which will be important in the somewhat unlikely event Butler has a lead in the final minutes. Graves is especially deadly, shooting 95.3% on the season (I repeat – 95%! He’s missed seven foul shots the entire season). So between that and the turnover avoidance, this is about the last team on the planet you’d want to be trailing late.

Do I think they can stun the defending champs? Not really. Horford in particular is going to be an impossible cover for Butler, and eventually Florida’s size and athleticism is likely to wear it down. But because Butler will shorten the game with its slow pace while avoiding mistakes that lead to easy Florida baskets, the Gators will have to earn it. I’m thinking the game stays in white-knuckle territory for Florida until the final eight minutes or so, when they pull away.

But I’ll say this: If Butler wins you can get that glass slipper ready, because they’re better than either of the teams in the late game. That one matches no. 7 UNLV against no. 3 Oregon and should be a more free-flowing game that provides a nice contrast to Butler’s plodding style. I’m fairly shocked UNLV got this far — the best team they played before the tournament was Arizona, and they lost that game by 14 points — but the Mountain West champs are on a nine-game winning streak after dispatching Georgia Tech and Wisconsin last weekend.

The key has been the play of 6-foot-6-inch guard Wendell White, a story that has been lost in all the pithy profiles of coach Lon Kruger and his son, point guard Kevin Kruger. White’s ability to score at the end of the shot clock and pile up points efficiently has been truly impressive — he shot 8-for-12 in both games and his tally so far is 41 points against three turnovers.

He’ll need his trigger finger ready against an Oregon team that features five starters who average double figures. The Ducks have little in the way of size or depth, but their starting lineup features four guards — yes, four — who shoot 40% or better on 3-pointers. “Big man” Maarty Leunen (all 215 pounds of him) is the lone scofflaw, at a measly 39.8%.

When the long-range bombs are catching net, Oregon piles up the points in a hurry, their 3-point avalanche in a 81–57 demolition of USC in the Pac 10 championship game is testament to that. When they’re not, as in Oregon’s 58–56 first-round squeaker against 14th-seeded Miami of Ohio, the Ducks are vulnerable to anyone. UNLV — the highest-seeded team remaining — needs the latter to happen, and for White to keep simmering, in order to pull the upset.

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There’s also a double-header at Continental Airlines Arena tonight, as No. 6 Vanderbilt meets No. 2 Georgetown in the undercard, followed by No. 1 North Carolina taking on No. 5 USC in the nightcap. Vanderbilt got a doublegift at the outset of the tournament — a ludicrously high seed and an incredibly easy bracket with two equally overrated teams (George Washington and Washington State). But their luck has run out, as the Commodores face the Big East champs. They’re out of Georgetown’s league, so look for the Hoyas to roll.

The nightcap should be a bit more interesting. USC can’t hang with the Tar Heels’ frontcourt, but the backcourt of Nick Young and Gabe Pruitt can keep them in the game if they get hot — as they did in a surprisingly easy win over no.4 Texas last weekend. Another concern for North Carolina is that forward Reyshawn Terry has strep throat. He’s supposedly going to play, but if I were coach Roy Williams I’d be terrified that he’s going to get everybody else on the team sick. If so, the Trojans will be one game from the Final Four — finally giving their fans something to talk about besides spring football.

jhollinger@nysun.com