Promise of a Season Like No Other for Florida Gators Basketball

Keyontae Johnson can yet again be the key to the Florida Gators basketball season. Photo Courtesy: UAA

There are questions just as there are every new basketball seasons. The last one ended abruptly back in March due to the Covid-19 virus that shut down all college sports. At that point in time we were fairly certain the Gators would get into the NCAA Tournament field, although we had no clue where they would be seeded or if they were capable of making it past the first weekend. Their win over then 4th-ranked Auburn in January convinced us they could play with anybody in the country but there were too many losses like the one at Ole Miss that raised far too many questions. So, when the season came crashing down not only for the Gators but everyone else in the country, we were left with an empty feeling and far too many questions.

Here we are months later in December and the virus hasn’t gone away. Although college sports have cranked up again, things are far from the same. There are precautions that have to be taken in the effort to protect the health of the athletes, coaches and support staff as well as fans that would like to attend games and yet all the care in the world can’t offer up blanket protection. Schedules are altered on an almost daily basis. Players have to go in quarantine whether for testing positive or coming in contact with someone who has. Nobody is safe it seems.

The virus shut down Florida’s basketball operations for 10 critical days and forced cancellation of the first three games, creating a need to schedule on the fly. Army and Boston College weren’t on the original schedule, but they were hastily arranged inserts that allowed the Gators to finally get on the floor for a two-game road trip to Mohegan Sun Resort in Connecticut. Just getting on the floor the first time had to be a relief for Mike White and his entire team but this is just the beginning of a season that might be as strange as any we’ve ever seen.

What we saw in Florida’s 76-69 game one win over a previously unbeaten Army team probably rehashed several of the questions that lingered when the previous season shut down. The Gators went through stretches when they couldn’t make a shot, couldn’t defend anyone, committed too many silly fouls and turned the ball over way too much. The first half was a grim reminder of too many games last season but then came a second half in which the Gators looked like a totally different team.

They were a Jekyll and Hyde team a year ago. Come to think of it, that’s the way they’ve been for the past five years.

The turnaround from one half to another felt eerily like last year’s norm when the Gators could play brilliantly as they did when they blew the doors off then 4th-ranked Auburn at the O-Dome only to follow that up with three consecutive confounding losses. A year ago we wondered if the Gators could ever find a consistent rhythm and the ability to close out games. It seems we never knew which Florida team was going to show up. One game into the new season we’re asking those same questions.

It is a pivotal season for White, now 109-65 as his sixth season on the job in Gainesville begins. White has taken the Gators to three straight NCAA Tournaments (2017-19) and almost certainly would have made it four in a row when the virus shut things down back in March. Ask the Florida fan base and a majority might tell you they believe the Gators have under-achieved even though they were two bad minutes at the end of an Elite Eight game in 2017 from advancing to the Final Four.

The fact that White succeeded a legend in Billy Donovan, who turned Florida into the kind of place where championships could be won, has worked against him when it comes to perceptions. By the time Donovan had completed four years at UF he had already taken the Gators to a Final Four. While it’s true White came close back in 2017, fans tend to point out that he did it with players left over from Donovan’s last couple of Florida teams.

The 2019-20 season was supposed to be White’s breakthrough season, the one in which he took the Gators to the Final Four. The roster was one he had recruited top to bottom and was bolstered by the grad transfer everybody in the country wanted in Kerry Blackshear Jr. Every preseason magazine had the Gators ranked among the top eight teams and Blackshear as the SEC Player of the Year. Every preseason magazine concluded that the Gators should make it at least to the Elite Eight. Once you get to the last eight teams standing, it’s always a crapshoot to advance to the Final Four but it seemed the Gators had everything it takes to make it.

The breakthrough never happened because the Gators never found a comfort zone. If the offense was clicking it seemed the defense couldn’t get stops. On those nights when the defense was playing up to White’s very high standards, the Gators couldn’t hit a shot. There were only a few games that could be considered complete – good at both ends of the floor.

And so it seemed against Army in the season opener but after stumbling through the first half, the Gators found a missing rhythm and intensity at both ends of the court. After trailing 39-31 at the half, the Gators outscored Army 45-30 in the second half. They got stops. They got rebounds. They hit shots. They got to the rim. They went 9-10 from the foul line in the final 2:30. They did everything a team is supposed to do to win a basketball game and that raises the question: Is the Army game what Yogi Berra would call déjà vu all over again – a sign that the inconsistencies of the past are still with us – or merely first game rust from a lack of practices and games due to the virus?

That we won’t know for at least a few more games.

White has better talent from top to bottom of his roster than he had a year ago when preseason expectations were through the roof. A year ago he could have used Tyree Appleby and Anthony Duruji, experienced transfers who had to sit out the season due to NCAA rules. The added experience and depth would have come in handy in games that White had to go long into a bench dominated by freshmen. This year, Appleby and Duruji are eligible, last year’s freshmen are experienced sophomores (Tre Mann, Scottie Lewis, Omar Payne, Ques Glover, Jason Jitoboh), and holdovers Keyontae Johnson and Noah Locke have been joined by immediately eligible Michigan transfer Colin Castleton, juco transfer Osayi Osifo and freshmen Samson Ruzhentsev and Neils Lane.

Johnson (6-5, 231) is the preseason SEC Player of the Year, so he’s rock solid in the starting lineup and versatile enough to play either the high post or on the wing. After a season in which he averaged 14 points and 7.1 rebounds per game, Johnson is the closest thing the Gators have to irreplaceable. He’s at his best defending the high post or the wing, but he’s proven he can defend anywhere on the floor. He’s not afraid to mix it up on the paint and he thrives doing the dirty work that nobody else wants to do. If there is a surprise to his game it’s the way he’s developed as an outside shooter (38% on three-pointers last year).

Beyond Johnson, there are a lot of interchangeable parts. That might be White’s biggest problem, finding the right rotations and fits for the other 12 players, all of whom can play.

When the Gators opened with Army, the lineup had Tre Mann (6-5) at the point with Lewis (8 points, 2 rebounds, 2 steals, 1 blocked shot) and Locke (7 points, 3 rebounds, 1 steal, 1 blocked shot) on the wings, Johnson (16 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals) at power forward and Castleton (9 points, 8 rebounds, 1 blocked shot) in the middle. Mann had a career high 19 points to go with six rebounds, five steals and four assists but he also spent a portion of the game interchanging with Appleby (6-1) at the wing and point. Appleby was a real spark in the second half when his 15 points represented all but two of Florida’s points off the bench. From an offensive standpoint, having Mann and Appleby in the lineup at the same time might be the best option especially on those games when Locke goes into a shooter’s coma and can’t miss. Having those three and Johnson in the lineup might prove to be Florida’s most lethal offensive lineup.

White wants an improved offensive team this year, one that moves the ball better and plays at a faster tempo than any time since he’s been Florida’s head coach. That is the style he played when he was the head coach at Louisiana Tech prior to Florida, but the personnel hasn’t matched up well enough to go up tempo at Florida. That issue has been solved with good recruiting so the players are in place for up tempo offense, but can this team play full court defense as well?

To play a full court game on defense, White’s best lineup would have Lewis and Payne in the game. Lewis is probably Florida’s best on ball defender. Despite being only 6-4, he led the Gators in blocked shots last year. Payne is limited as an offensive player but at the other end of the floor he can erase and he makes a great safety in the press game. A year ago, Payne (6-10) wanted to block every shot, not untypical of freshman big guys but the hope is the offseason and experience have added the maturity he needs. Duruji might also be an option for full court pressing defense. He may only be 6-7 but his vertical is said to be 48 inches so he will play taller than his height. He could also be the eraser/safety when the Gators go full court.

If the Gators can put the virus behind them and White can involve all 13 players on his roster in practice and games, we’ll get a far better idea of the Gators’ capability of playing the style White prefers. Offensively, they figure to be better. Most of the questions will have to do with a defense that was the most inconsistent of White’s five years on the job. Can they get stops? Can they take opponents out of their game with pressure whether full court or half court. Can they play faster? Can they dictate tempo at both ends of the court? Offensively, can they make shots and avoid those lengthy dead periods when they can’t put the ball in the hole? Can they continue to make free throws to close out games?

Perhaps the biggest question of all, can they make it all the way through a season without a number of players missing portions of the schedule due to the virus? Florida football was forced into a rescheduling at midseason due to an outbreak of the virus. Fortunately for the Gators, they came out of the break better than they were before. Will Florida basketball have the same success if the virus causes a shutdown that lasts a week or even two?

Starting a season with a lot of questions isn’t unusual but starting a basketball season in the midst of a pandemic is. Add pandemic-related questions to those that have to be asked and answered at the beginning of any season and this promises to be a year like none we’ve ever experienced.

Because of the pandemic, White or any other coach probably shouldn’t be judged as if all things were normal, but he will be. Like it or not. If there is a break to be caught it will be that expectations are lower so if the Gators play better than anyone predicts or expects, perceptions may change.

There are plenty of variables in this equation that is Florida’s 2020-21 basketball season but like any equation, there is always that X or unknown factor. In this case the unknown is Covid-19. From what we know the Gators have more than adequate talent to have an outstanding season. What we don’t know is how the virus is going to alter things. It’s possible the Gators could have a championship caliber season. It is also possible that the virus will wreak havoc with all plans and just getting through the season will require tremendous patience and expectations that are ever-changing.

It promises to be a season like no other.