The Gators have momentum on their side. They’ve won four games in a row, all of which required gusty performances down the stretch.
They’ve gotten center Colin Castleton back into the starting lineup. Their best shooter, Myreon Jones, has made 14 of his last 23 three-pointers after an extended slump. Tyree Appleby has consistently made smart decisions with the ball and made big plays late to help his team pull out some wins. Phlandrous Fleming has played the best basketball of his brief UF career.
There are still plenty of things to correct for the Gators, but the positivity surrounding the program is at its highest level since the six-game winning streak to start the season.
For the Gators’ momentum to continue past about 6 p.m. on Saturday, they’re going to need to play by far their best game of the season. They’ll take on No. 5 Kentucky in Rupp Arena.
The Wildcats (20-4, 9-2 SEC) are considered a national championship contender, and it’s easy to understand why. Coach John Calipari annually stockpiles NBA talent like it’s nothing, which has actually hurt them over the past few years. They’ve been so young that by the time everything finally started to click, that group of freshmen was gone and it was time to start all over again.
Calipari seems to have struck the right balance between talented young players and savvy veterans this time around. They’ve got a likely one-and-done guard in TyTy Washington, but upperclassmen Sahvir Wheeler, Keion Brooks, Oscar Tshiebwe, Davion Mintz and Kellan Grady are also crucially important parts of the team.
There are no glaringly obvious weaknesses with this team. They rank first in the SEC in scoring and in field goal percentage, fourth in scoring defense and third in field goal percentage defense. They’re the best three-point shooting team in the league after several years of struggles from out there, and they’re the second-best three-point defensive team. They also lead the league in rebounding by a wide margin.
“I think that they rebound it at an elite level,” Florida coach Mike White said. “Offensively, I think they’ve got it all. I think they can really pass it. They’ve got a downhill point guard who’s as fast as anyone in the country, which leads to, in my opinion, probably the best transition offense in the country. They’ve got playmakers who can go get stuff off the bounce. They’re a good screening team. They’ve got a couple high-level shooters. And let’s say all of that fails; they’ve got maybe the best rebounder offensively that I’ve scouted.
“Defensively, it’s a typical Kentucky team that’s going to be very stingy and physical and in the right spots. They’re going to take pride in the defensive end.”
Everything for them starts with Tshiebwe, their violently strong big man. He’s sixth in the conference in scoring at 15.9 points per game, and he also leads the league with 15.1 rebounds per game. No other player in the SEC is even averaging double figures in rebounds. He’s grabbed 20 or more rebounds in a game five times this season, including 28 in a game against Western Kentucky.
Tshiebwe, a West Virginia transfer, also ranks fifth in the conference in steals with 1.9 per game, and he’s tied for fourth with 1.5 blocks per game. Basically, he’s going to touch the ball at least once on every possession, at both ends of the floor.
He’s the runaway favorite for SEC Player of the Year, and this might be the only time all season that Castleton will be overpowered in the post.
The key for Castleton and the rest of UF’s frontcourt players is to limit the number of offensive rebounds that he gets. He’s almost certainly going to record a double-double. They’ve just got to keep him from completely taking over the game like he’s done multiple times this season.
“We’ve got to do it by committee,” White said. “That’s our only choice. Obviously, we’ve got to swarm to the ball, we’ve got to play as hard as we’ve played, especially on the defensive glass.
“We can’t get pounded on the offensive glass. That’s not just on our bigs, although they’ve got to do a better job, our fours have got to do a better job. But our wings, our guards, we’ve got to help out frontcourt clean up some of those possessions. We’ve got to finish possessions with more defensive rebounds.”
Washington provides the Wildcats with some scoring punch from the wing. He’s averaging 12.9 points per game on 48.6 percent shooting, including a respectable 35.2 percent from deep.
Wheeler, a transfer from Georgia, is extremely quick and one of the top ball handlers in the league. He leads the SEC with 7.2 assists per game. He and Washington have the two best assist-to-turnover ratios in the conference.
Then they’ve got two of the league’s best three-point shooters in Grady (44.2 percent) and Mintz (36.4 percent).
And, of course, not to be overlooked is the Rupp Arena effect, as the Wildcats haven’t lost at home this season. While the Gators have a veteran team that’s played in a bunch of road games, there’s nothing that compares to the environment inside Rupp Arena. There’s going to be more than 20,000 fans inside the building, and they’re going to be extremely loud throughout the entirety of the game.
That kind of environment can rattle even the most seasoned of teams and allow Kentucky to go on some big runs. The Gators (16-8, 6-5) will need to be mentally tough enough to bounce back from rough stretches and try to win the next play. This game could get away from them in a hurry if they’re not careful.
“It’s very important [to block out the noise], being that we are on this winning streak that we’re on and being an older team,” Fleming said. “We’re expected to be able to go in there and compete to get a win in a place like where we’re going.”
Wins in Lexington have been hard to come by over the years for the Gators, as they’ve won there just 11 times in 64 tries. If they’re able to pull this one off on Saturday, it will rank as one of the most improbable wins in the series’ history.
Kentucky is a championship-caliber team. Florida will need to play like one, too, to have a chance at the upset.
“It’s one of the reasons that these guys came here and we all came here, for opportunities like this in tough environments,” White said. “It’s high-level college basketball. We look at it as fun. It’s a huge challenge, but, if we don’t have fun with it, shame on us. We look forward to it.
“Hopefully, we can grow throughout the 40, we can overcome some adversity. Hopefully, you’ve got a chance if you play well enough to be in position to do something down the stretch. That’s all you can ask for on the road in the SEC these days.”