Florida Ranked 6th In Preseason Basketball AP Poll

The AP Poll voters cast their first ballots of the season on Monday and the Gators were rewarded with a #6 ranking entering the 2019-20 college basketball season. This ranking shows a voting group that is high on the returning talent of Andrew Nembhard, Noah Locke, and Keyontae Johnson, the star-studded recruiting class featuring Tre Mann and Scottie Lewis, and of course, the imact of graduate transfer Kerry Blackshear Jr.

Ahead of the Gators (who received 1313 poll points) were:

#5 Louisville (1386)
#4 Duke (1399)
#3 Kansas (1457)
#2 Kentucky (1497)
#1 Michigan State (1619)

Joining Florida and Kentucky from the SEC are LSU (#22) and Auburn (#24).

Florida had a few non-conference opponents make the polls as well with Baylor getting a #16 ranking, Utah State getting #17, and potential Charleston Classic opponent Xavier landing at #19, all offering some great resume opportunities.

The last time the Gators were in the top 10 of the preseason poll was before the 2014-15 season when they came in at #7. Of course, that season didn’t go particularly well and a better fate will be expected with this year’s group.

While getting ranked #6 isn’t bad at all it could easily be argued that the Gators should be higher but they’ll have every chance to climb the polls with the competition they’ll be playing in the non-conference slate. It’s also important to remember that the NCAA Tournament selection committee doesn’t factor in AP Poll ranking to any of their sorting tools and therefore the poll is functionally useless. Practically speaking it definitely matters in the eyes of college basketball fans and a solid ranking will keep eyes on the Gators all year long.

In other preseason ranking news Ken Pomeroy released his preseason KenPom rankings. KenPom is the most important of prediction basketball analytics as it’s commonly believed to be the most accurate and the NCAA Tournament selection committee factors it into their decisions.

Florida landed at #12 in KenPom.

This, of course, seems lower than what you’d expect for the Gators but considering how many new pieces they have a preseason prediction is tough for them from an algorithm standpoint. One thing that will be encouraging for Gator fans is that KenPom has them as the 23rd ranked offense. That would be a major improvement from their 61st ranked offense last year and if their offense really is that good they should win a lot of games due to the fact Mike White has proven his teams will always be elite on the defensive end.

KenPom also predicts the outcome of each game and they have the Gators going 23-6 going into postseason play with losses to Butler, Missouri, LSU, Tennessee, and Kentucky twice.

Florida’s season begins on November 5th when the Gators take on North Florida, a game KenPom predicts them to win 85-65.

Eric Fawcett
Eric is a basketball coach and writer from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. His work has been found at NBA international properties, ESPN, Bleacher Report, CBS Sports, Lindy's and others. He loves zone defenses, the extra pass, and a 30 second shot clock. Growing up in Canada, an American channel showing SEC basketball games was his first exposure to Gator hoops, and he has been hooked ever since. You can follow him on Twitter at @ericfawcett_.