The Florida Gators basketball team has put together quite the offseason after bringing home the programs third National Championship on April 7th. Since then, head coach Todd Golden and his staff have landed two highly touted guards in the portal in Princeton’s Xaivian Lee and Arkansas’ Boogie Fland, who ranks as the 4th best guard in the transfer portal, according to 247Sports. Florida also added Ohio’s AJ Brown, an efficient scorer that should help the Gators’ offense space the floor.
While the additions Golden made to the team seem promising, there’s still one more huge piece to the puzzle, the return of Alex Condon.
The 6’11 forward entered the NBA Draft after starting 35 games for the Gators last season while averaging 10.6 points and 7.5 rebounds per game. Condon maintained his college eligibility, however, leaving the door open for a potential return to Gainesville.
In a recent interview with SI’s Kevin Sweeney, Condon explained that he has a good situation waiting for him at Florida but is prepared to stay in the draft if necessary.
“I gotta get that almost guaranteed (to stay in draft),” Condon told Sweeney. “I know I’m in that 20 to 35 range right now, but you know, I’ve got a good situation waiting for me at Florida. It has to be a good situation for me to stay (in draft), but feedback I’m getting from teams right now is positive and I’m ready to stay in if I need to.”
Despite Condon expected to work out in front of multiple NBA teams before the deadline to drop out, Todd Golden remains cautiously optimism that Condon will be back for his junior season.
“We’ve had good conversations with Alex. We’ve been really respectful of his process, and he’s been great in terms of communicating with us, in terms of where everything’s at. I’m cautiously optimistic,” Golden told the media on Thursday. “We’re going to, again, be very mindful of his process. He’s getting great workouts of teams. He’s looked good in different combine events. I think we’ll find out, my hope is on the 27th – the day before the deadline – and I’m hoping for good news for the Gators. But I love Condo regardless, and he obviously was really impactful in his winning national championship. So we’re grateful for him.”
Condon is on the record wanting a ‘guarantee’ from an NBA team, which is a difficult ask given his late first round, early second round projection. With the decision expected to bleed into next week, Florida has to have a backup plan in place if Condon does in fact remain in the draft.
“Obviously if he did not return it would be a blow,” Golden said on Condon. “I mean he’s a great player. But yes, cautiously optimistic. I mean I will never speak for Alex, but based on some of the conversations we’ve had as a staff about what he feels like he would need to stay in the draft, we are cautiously optimistic. I’m not saying he can’t get (a guarantee), but you just never know and it’s just early. The NBA Draft, I think, is June 26th or 25th or something like that. So there’s a lot of time between when these guys have to decide and when the NBA Draft is and a lot can change. So, that’s why I say that, but it would be a blow, for sure. We have some contingency plans, but we want Alex back.”
If Condon returns, Florida will have their top four front court players back in 2025-26 as Florida’s center Rueben Chinyelu recently announced his withdraw from the NBA Draft. Condon is the last piece to the puzzle in building another National Championship caliber roster.