Florida basketball: Gators start season with sky high expectations

There is this old Southern saying that goes like this: “If you shoot low, you’ll probably hit your target.” There is no shooting low for Florida’s preseason No. 1 basketball team, who open their pursuit of a second national championship in three years tonight at Tampa’s Benchmark Arena (6 p.m., ESPN2) against No. 14 Miami. The Gators return the nation’s most experienced starting lineup, led by Tommy Haugh, Rueben Chinyelu and Alex Condon, all of whom chose to return to Florida for one more chance at a title rather than move on to the NBA.

The starting lineup, which includes Denzel Aberdeen, back to UF after a year in exile at Kentucky, and Boogie Fland, who started all 35 games at the point for the Gators last year, has a combined 502 games of playing experience, 291 in the starting lineup. Haugh was a second team All-America last year and is projected as the SEC Player of the Year. Chinyelu was the winner of the Naismith National Defensive Player of the Year last season. Condon is a two-time All-SEC performer.

“It’s national championship or bust for this team,” Haugh said during the summer months. “That’s my mindset. I think that’s our whole team’s mindset.”

If there are concerns for Todd Golden, they center around two things: 3-point shooting and the bench.

In exhibition games against North Florida, Baylor and Stetson, the Gators were a combined 27-99 from the 3-point line. After a dismal 4-29 effort against Baylor in the second exhibition game, Aberdeen and last year’s SEC Sixth Man of the Year Urban Klavzar heated up to combine for 10 threes in 17 attempts. The rest of the team went 1-10.

History says the Gators should be better this year. Aberdeen, who averaged 13.5 per game last year at Kentucky, is a career 35.1 percent shooter from three, while Klavzar shot 40.6 percent last year off the bench. Haugh slumped to 32.6 percent as the season wore on a year ago, but he proved in the Gators’ run to the NCAA title in 2025 that he can hit threes in the clutch. AJ Brown, who redshirted last year after transferring from Ohio, is a career 37.1 percent shooter from three and international import Domen Petrovic shot 36.3 percent in the Slovenian league.

The bench didn’t exactly rip and shred during the preseason. Against Baylor bench production was limited to three points. Klavzar started and scored 24 against Stetson, which is why bench production was a mere four points. Florida’s bench rotation figures to be Klavzar and Isaiah Brown first off the bench on the perimeter, and Petrovic and Arturas Butajevas in the big man rotation. AJ Brown played well against North Florida, didn’t shoot well against Baylor and didn’t play against Stetson. CJ Ingram, expected to be a consistent contributor, has been sidelined with lower back issues, and Alex Lloyd has yet to get his shot working.

Last Thursday Golden said, “Our reserves didn't give us as big of a lift as we need [against Stetson] and that's going to be something that we need some guys to step up before you know Monday and as the season starts.

If there is a key to the bench rotation, it could be Isaiah Brown, who provided explosive minutes at both ends of the court last season. Brown had a pair of lackluster performances against Baylor and Stetson.

“I think that's kind of the challenge is figuring out how to get guys comfortable, playing unafraid to fail and just kind of letting it all hang out a little bit,” Golden said last week. “And we got to find that. We've had a really good camp … I think Isaiah is the one that we're kind of talking about a lot because he's proven it before, and we still have full confidence that he'll get ripping. And for him, I think it's a matter of time."

In Miami, the Gators will be facing an experienced team that won 26 games a year ago in Jai Lucas’ first year as head coach. Lucas, the son of former Maryland All-American John Lucas, spent his freshman year playing for the Gators back in 2007-08 before transferring to Texas. His already deep roster was bolstered in the offseason by picking up shot blocker Somto Cyril from Georgia and point guard Brent Bland from Saint Peter’s.

Golden knows what to expect from the Hurricanes, who went 26-9 a year ago when they beat Missouri and then lost to Purdue in the second round of the NCAA Tournament. Key players back from that team are Malik Reneau (18.9 points, 6.9 rebounds) and Shelton Henderson (13.9 points, 4.9 rebounds). Reneau has had some injury issues in the preseason but is expected to play limited minutes against the Gators.

“They have a lot of talent across the board,” Golden said. “They're pretty big, and they picked up some good pieces. I think they have a little more depth than they had last year.”

STARTING LINEUPS

No. 1 Florida: Alex Condon (6-11, 236, SR); Rueben Chinyelu (6-10, 265, SR); Tommy Haugh (6-9, 215, SR); Denzel Aberdeen (6-5, 190, 5th); Boogie Fland (6-3, 185, JR)

No. 14 Miami: Shelton Henderson (6-6, 239, SO); Somto Cyril (6-11, 263, JR); Caleb Gaskins (6-8, 221, FR); Dante Allen (6-4, 225, SO); Acaden Lewis (6-2, 187, SO)

AS THE NCAA TURNS … SEASON STARTS, LAWSUITS GALORE

The Division I college basketball season begins in earnest today, but not without eligibility issues being fought in courts across the country as the NCAA, in its infinite wisdom, chooses to challenge athletes who graduated high school in 2022 from gaining a fifth year of eligibility. The NCAA contends that granting a fifth year to athletes who were fourth-year seniors during the 2025-26 athletic year while granting a fifth year to all of last year’s underclassmen gives unfair advantages and undermines its ability to enforce its own rules. Last week in Kentucky and Ohio, the NCAA took a 1-2 punch to the chin from the Kentucky Court of Appeals and the Ohio Supreme Court.

In Kentucky, Court of Appeals Judge Sara Walter Combs denied the NCAA’s request for emergency relief from a temporary injunction that granted more than 30 athletes eligibility. In Ohio, where Governor Mike DeWine issued an executive order on October 13 that granted a fifth year of eligibility to all athletes in the state of Ohio who graduated in 2022, the Ohio Supreme Court intervened, upholding a preliminary injunction from a court in Cincinnati that gave a fifth year to a group of athletes, mostly from Xavier and Cincinnati.

Judge Combs wrote in her decision that the NCAA failed to prove “imminent, ruinous and incalculable injury” by granting the fifth year. Further, Judge Combs wrote that the NCAA continues to “flip-flop repeatedly as our courts work through the underlying issues.”

In Ohio, where a group of athletes mostly from Xavier and Cincinnati, won a temporary restraining order against the NCAA during the summer, Governor DeWine issued an executive order stating that athletes from the 2022 high school class should be allowed to play providing, of course, they are under the NCAA age limit and have not participated in professional league activities. The Ohio Supreme Court cited the executive order in its decision to allow the preliminary injunction to remain in effect.

On both rulings, the NCAA stated it will appeal in the Federal Courts. An NCAA legal beagle in Ohio said, “The NCAA will continue to pursue all available avenues to defend the membership’s rules.” In addition to continuing its fight in the courts against the athletes, the NCAA decided to sue the governor of Ohio, claiming his executive order “has no foundation.”

Meanwhile, on Wednesday in the state of Georgia, RJ Godfrey, who played at Clemson but is seeking a fifth year to play at Arizona, and 14 other players withdrew their names from a lawsuit against the NCAA. Godfrey was initially granted a temporary restraining order in his home state of Georgia, but the Georgia Court of Appeals issued a stay on September 9. With oral arguments now scheduled for January 12, Godfrey and others involved in his lawsuit withdrew their names, presumably to seek other pathways toward eligibility.

Responding to a question regarding the NCAA’s decision to fight to the bitter end in the courts, where historically it loses, Tennessee basketball coach Rick Barnes took a measured shot against the NCAA.

“You know what I wish somebody would do right now?” Barnes asked. “I wish they would do an audit of how much money the NCAA is spending on attorney fees. I’d like them to do that because they’ve dug their heels in. If you think about this right now, I think there are like maybe 500 cases of guys and girls that are trying to play. What if each one of them sued the NCAA for a million dollars? Think about it. It’s $500 million. [The NCAA is] going to have to go to court with them. I’d rather they take that money and give it to Olympic sports, you know? And my deal is, whether it is what it is, [the NCAA] created this problem, which they have in the past, too.”

Here are SEC players currently involved in NCAA lawsuits:

Auburn: Kolby King eligible

FLORIDA: Denzel Aberdeen eligible

LSU: Donovan Dent and Skyy Clark eligible

Mississippi State: Kimani Hamilton eligible

Missouri: Mark Mitchell eligible; CJ Gunn ineligible

Oklahoma: Duke Brennan and BJ Edwards eligible; Tae Davis ineligible

Ole Miss: Micah Handlogten and Corey Stephenson eligible

Tennessee: Jalen Washington ineligible

Texas A&M: Jordan Pope eligible; Rylan Griffen ineligible

THIS WEEK IN THE SEC

Monday games

Sam Houston at No. 20 Alabama

Arkansas-Pine Bluff at No. 12 Arkansas

North Carolina Central at Georgia

Tennessee Tech at Mississippi State

East Texas A&M at Oklahoma

Alcorn State at Ole Miss

Chicago State at No. 7 Texas

Bellarmine at No. 24 Vanderbilt

Tuesday games

Manhattan at No. 23 Kentucky

LSU-New Orleans at LSU

Cleveland State at Missouri

Stetson at South Carolina

Wofford at No. 8 Tennessee

Alabama State at Texas A&M

Wednesday game

Southeastern Louisiana at Auburn