By: Nick Marcinko -- October 1, 2025 Micah Handlogten was one of the more inspiring stories from Florida’s National Championship season. The 7’1 center was not supposed to play after suffering a gruesome leg injury during the SEC Championship game vs. Auburn on March 17th, 2024. The plan was for Handlogten to medically redshirt, giving him ample time to recover and get his body back in playing condition. But as the 2024-25 season progressed and the Gators’ appeared to be a legitimate contender, Handlogten made the unselfish decision to return for his teammates despite already missing more than half the season, providing Florida with much needed depth after a pair of injuries to their front court. https://www.gatorcountry.com/florid...es-mobility-strength-ahead-of-2025-26-season/
I am hoping he shed some of the hesitancy to put up a shot (which predated the injury) along with the excess pounds. That would be a real bonus for the team.
In practice clips, he looked good in pick-and-roll, but he's always been pretty good in that. Where the new conditioning showing up is in low post moves. Looking much better there.
I see him scoring points off of offensive rebounds rather than set plays. Before his injury he was an elite offensive rebounder. With the added muscle he could become a monster. Haugh is a bit undersized for the dual role pick-and-roll/pick-and-pop guy. But pick and pop could work for him as he has a good outside shot. And if the defender gives him a step the pick-and-roll could also work.
Not sure if it was a conditioning issue, but Chinyelu rarely played more than 20 minutes last year. Would be great if we can thrive with the 3 bigs playing close to 80 minutes and if the plan works out leave Thomas at the 3 for most of his minutes.
Chinyelu is a chiseled beast. I think it had more to do with free-throw shooting than conditioning. Any game within 10 points in the last 5 minutes is going to see more fouling and free-throws. Tommy shot 79% while Chins shot 58%. It's an easy call by the coaches.
The only way this would work is if we played Chinyelu and Handlogten at the same time. It’s not the craziest idea in the world, but I don’t think we ever did it last year. That lineup might leave us slightly offensively challenged, but should be solid defensively.
I could see Handlogten spelling both Chin and Condon. We have a lot of fire power at the one thru three, that it could happen.
