The Florida Gators basketball team tips off at noon for the third time this season at home on Saturday against the Texas A&M Aggies. The Gators played shaky, to say the least, in the first two noon tips of the season.
The first came in an 80-76 overtime victory over Georgia, but Florida was lucky to come away with a win with sluggish play throughout the game. Without outstanding play off the bench from Canyon Barry, that included two improbable four-point plays, the Gators probably wouldn’t have even been close to pulling out the win.
The only other noon tip to this point did not end quite as well for Florida. The 68-66 loss at home to Vanderbilt put Florida at its lowest point of the season. It was the second loss in a row, after falling to South Carolina on the road the game before. It was a slow day from the start, as the Commodores took an 8-0 lead in the first minutes of the game. The Gators were not ready to play.
Since that disappointing loss to the Commodores, Florida has gone from its lowest point to its highest point of the season in less than three weeks. The Gators are on a five-game winning streak, all by double figures, but that streak will be put to the test on Saturday.
The earliest start since the streak began was a 2 p.m. tip at Oklahoma. Every other game took place at night. Now, the Gators will have to get their minds in the right place early in the morning, something they have struggled find a way to do and haven’t had to do in weeks.
Mike White is taking extra measures to be sure the sluggish play doesn’t happen again due to an early start-time.
“One thing we’ve done a little bit differently is we took it a little bit easier yesterday,” said White. “I want to make sure that we’re really fresh, and we’ll change up the routine a little bit tomorrow morning compared to what we’ve done the past couple of noon games. We actually got up really early and shot, and we’ll try to give them a little more sleep tomorrow morning if we have a really good practice today. We’ll see. We might make a deal with the guys.”
The players are well aware of their early-game struggles this season. It’s something they have focused on and talked about in preparations for Texas A&M and they know it is something that must be fixed before noon on Saturday.
“I think we’re definitely conscious of that. Just having the right mindset, we can’t have any excuses, we had to wake up early or we had to get to shoot-around or anything like that,” said Barry. “We just have to get going. I think at this point everyone realizes how important every game is, especially with this SEC race being so tight. I think we’ll be ready to play at noon.”
This is a different team than the one that took the court three weeks ago against Vanderbilt and four weeks ago against Georgia. At the time of the Vanderbilt game, White said there was finger-pointing going on between players and a lot of last year’s selfishness showing back up.
Since then, selfishness hasn’t even been a worry for this team. Guys are playing for something different now, and that could be all the difference this team needs to get going early in the morning.
“I think everyone’s head is in a good spot, we’re all playing for each other and we just want to keep winning and I think it shows on the court,” Barry said. “Everyone’s super happy for each other, no one’s getting in their feelings, no one has personal agendas, and I think that’s part of the reason we’ve been so successful these past few games.”