The Only Thing Certain for Florida Gators Basketball Is Uncertainty

What will the Florida Gators look like without Keyontae Johnson? Photo Credit: Tim Casey

“Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.” – Forrest Gump

Mike White knows the feeling. Five games into the 18-game Southeastern Conference grind that is also the post-Keyontae Johnson portion of the basketball schedule, never knows what he’s going to get from one night to the next with his Florida Gators. White’s one certainty is uncertainty. The most recent win over Ole Miss at the O-Dome is the perfect example.

Trailing by nine points (61-52) with 6:28 remaining in the game, the Gators were dead in the water. Other than spectacular defensive play by 6-11 Michigan transfer Colin Castleton and a few nice put backs by the big guy, the Gators had the look of a fish on the verge of going belly up.

And then things changed. Just like that.

In those final six minutes, the Gators got it done at both ends of the court, turning a nine-point deficit into a nine-point win. That 20-2 burst was highlighted by an end-of-the-game 14-0 run that left you asking yourself just where did that come from?

Castleton’s explanation was “We were in a timeout and I think we were, I don’t want to say exactly, but we were down … and I kind of just stopped the guys and was like, ‘We gotta dig in. We have to figure out what we have to do to win this game, like we are not losing this game no matter what shape or form, we are not losing this game.’ We did what we needed to do, got the stops and hit some big shots.”

That is exactly what the Gators did. Castleton’s contributions in the 72-63 win were 21 points, 10 rebounds and eight blocked shots. He must have altered another five or six as he completely took Ole Miss out of the paint and forced the Rebels to try to win the game shooting jump shots. They made a bunch of shots to take the lead. They missed a bunch down the stretch when they needed them most, but that’s almost always the story for teams lacking an inside game.

In Florida’s three wins, Castleton’s totals are 65 points (more than 20 in each victory), 21 rebounds, four assists and 11 blocked shots. In the two losses, he has 19 points, 11 rebounds, one assist, one blocked shot and one steal. In the four games prior to the SEC schedule kicking in, Castleton had 26 points, 18 rebounds, one assist, five blocked shots and a steal.

The easiest thing to say would be that if Colin Castleton is on his game, the Gators do very well. While there may be a measure of truth to that statement, it’s not exactly that simple. Castleton’s game is only good if the people around him are playing with some measure of intensity and consistency. He opens up the floor for the shooters on the outside. When they hit shots, they open the game up for him.

In the Ole Miss game, Castleton carried the Gators on his back for much of the game but in the final explosive six minutes, Tre Mann and Noah Locke found their mojo at the offensive end and the rest of the team seemed to feed off Castleton’s defensive intensity. Anthony Duruji and Tyree Appleby seemed to grow an extra set of arms and ballerina feet the way they swarmed to the ball and harassed Ole Miss shooters. The swish of the nets was replaced by the clang of the iron.

Tre Mann is gaining confidence on the offensive end of the floor

When the final horn sounded we were left to wonder which Florida team is for real? Was it the one that showed such grit and determination to score the kind of comeback win over Ole Miss? Was it the one that made the clutch free throws down the stretch to take out a very good LSU team? Or was it the one that played the first 33-plus minutes against Ole Miss like it had a bad hangover from the Alabama and Kentucky losses?

If Mike White knows the answer to those questions, he should change his first name to Claire and his last name to Voyant. The only thing he knows is if he had a healthy Keyontae Johnson there is every good chance the Gators would be ranked right now. Johnson is a difference-maker whose greatest asset might be his Larry Bird-like ability to turn his focus every game to exactly what the Gators need to win. If it’s scoring he can deliver whether in the paint or from the outside. If it’s defense, he can lock down even when he gives up 3-5 inches. His 42-inch vertical lends itself to spectacular dunks and rebounds but causes us to overlook how use of his wide body for perfect position makes for easy stick backs and rebounds. He isn’t a point guard, but he passes like one when he gets into the paint.

But Johnson is gone for the foreseeable future and we won’t know for some time if or when he will be able to resume his basketball playing career. Without him, White and the Gators are going to be that box of chocolates.

With a lineup of Mann at the point, Locke and Scottie Lewis on the wings and Castleton and Duruji as the two bigs, the Gators broke out of the SEC gates 2-0, scoring 91 against a Vandy team that will call a break-even year a roaring success and 83 against an LSU team that will easily make the Big Dance unless the NCAA puts the Tigers in its jailhouse for a myriad of recruiting violations.

There was an element of maturity missing in the losses to Alabama and Kentucky. Beating Alabama in Tuscaloosa would have been a tall order considering the way Nate Oates has the Crimson Tide playing right now, but the Gators should have and could have played the game much closer than 86-71. The wheels came off might be the best way to describe the 76-58 loss to Kentucky. The Big Blue Nation is convinced the Wildcats are in dire need of an exorcist but on this night they were dialed in and took the Gators out physically, mentally and emotionally. Kentucky played like grown men. The Gators played like a bad team from the YMCA church league.

In some respects, the Kentucky game and the Kentucky team are mirror images of the Florida Gators. No, the Gators don’t have a lineup of 5-star guys who expect to be one-and-done, but this is a talented Florida team even without Johnson. Kentucky is off to a 4-7 start that is the worst in more than 90 years and the reason for the bad start has everything to do with a lack of leadership on the floor along with an inability to keep focused enough to play through the rough stretches that are part of every game.

Florida has the same, exact problem.

When Castleton stepped it up in the huddle and essentially demanded more of himself and his teammates against Ole Miss, it may have been the bold step in leadership the Gators need. Keyontae helps out at practice, assists the coaches with the game plan and he’s there on the bench during games, but someone on the court has to be the guy who keeps everyone accountable and focused. Castleton drew a line in the dirt and said no more in the Ole Miss game but was this a one-shot deal or what we can expect every game in the future? The Gators responded once. Can they do it again?

The Gators do have some other issues, one of which has to do with play at the point. Tre Mann is a truly gifted scorer who has performed admirably at the point but with Keyontae’s points gone for the year, the Gators need Mann to focus more on point production. White shuffled the lineup against Ole Miss, starting Appleby at the point and Mann on the wing. Appleby handled the point well and Mann put up 17 points, looking very comfortable in doing so. Mann had 18 combined in the losses to Alabama and Kentucky. White is likely to stick with Appleby at the point because he’s got to have the scoring.

Another issue that White will have to deal with moving forward is the other wing. Heading into the Alabama and Kentucky games, Lewis was playing like an All-SEC performer with 16 against Vandy and 17 against LSU. Then came Alabama and Kentucky games when his two game totals were four points and four rebounds. He missed the Ole Miss game due to health protocols and Locke started in his place after coming off the bench against Kentucky. Locke turned in his best game in quite some time, hitting 3-6 of his 3-pointers and all four of his free throws at crunch time as part of a 15-point effort.

Moving forward, does Locke continue to start with Lewis coming off the bench or the other way around? Lewis can be ever so explosive around the rim and he has his moments when he heats up from the 3-point line. Lewis is also a better defender but when Locke is feeling it he can light it up from the 3-point line like few others in the country. Locke is hitting 42.2% from the 3-point line this year and is a career 40.5% shooter. His ability to stretch the floor certainly opens things up for Castleton on the inside.

White needs more consistency on the offensive end from Duruji. His size and leaping ability have factored well on the defensive end, but he can disappear offensively as he did against Alabama (3-11 shooting, eight points) and Ole Miss (1-7 shooting, three points).

The need for point production has everything to do with freshman Samson Ruzhentsev starting to get some minutes. He’s a pure shooter of Locke’s caliber but he’s still learning the game so White has to pick and choose when to put him into the game because he gets lost defensively. He could prove to be a good zone buster in the future.

Omar Payne hasn’t broken through on the offensive end as White had hoped but he remains an intimidator on the defensive end. Still, opponents have shown a willingness to guard him loosely on the offensive end and the Gators need some consistency there.

Ques Glover was solid off the bench in the win over Ole Miss. If White stays with Appleby at the point, his minutes will pick up as well. He’s very good defensively in a full court game but remains somewhat of a liability defensively in the half court.

Freshman Neils Lane has played in seven games and juco transfer Osayi Osifo has played in six. There hasn’t been a Jason Jitoboh sighting in more than a month.

Essentially, it’s a nine-man rotation that White has to work with unless Lane and/or Osifo come around enough to demand more minutes. That’s not a lot of depth particularly at a time when Covid-19 can leave teams short-handed for two or three games at a time. The virus is the other piece of the equation that White is working with. Lewis and walk-on Alex Klatsky are the only players who have had to miss a game so far but there is always that uncertainty that goes with the pandemic. The virus has altered schedules around the league and it seems only a matter of time before Florida has a game rescheduled, whether because of an outbreak on the team or with an opponent.

There is that word again. Uncertainty. It is the one constant in this season, especially since Keyontae Johnson went down. In their five SEC games, the Gators have shown they can beat a very good team, come from behind to beat one that has its moments, and blow out a young Vandy team that is still feeling its way. They’ve also shown they can get flustered on the road and against a team like Kentucky that can put the hammer on opponents on those evenings when John Calipari doesn’t need a shrink to deal with the mental and emotional issues on his roster.

Right now, the key to success seems to be Castleton, who is a real defensive presence and has shown in three SEC games that he can be a force offensively. He also took that bold step in leadership in the Ole Miss win. That will have to continue. If Castleton can be the force in the middle on both ends of the court, that will free Mann up to be the scorer he’s capable of being and will create space for Locke and the other shooters. Consistency from the others can make this team good enough to win a lot of games.

But will they win? Can they be consistent? Can they avoid the mental breakdowns that they suffered in the Alabama and Kentucky games? At this point at least, the Gators are that box of chocolates Forrest Gump talked about. You never know what you’re gonna get.