(Photo by Chris Spears) A few thoughts to jump start your Monday morning: Spring football enters its final phase this week leading to the Orange and Blue Game on Saturday. This will be the first opportunity the public will have a chance to see how the Gators are adapting to Jon Sumrall and his coaching staff. Based on solid reporting from several sources including Zach Goodall of the Swamp247 site, here is a look at the offense that took the field in a scrimmage Saturday.   Sumrall has stated in interviews and press conferences that spring football will not guarantee a starting job when fall practice begins, but here is a position-by-position look at the offense that took the field on Saturday.   QB: Aaron Philo (6-1, 208, RSO); Tramell Jones Jr. (6-0, 199, RFR) RB: Jadan Baugh (6-1, 228, JR); Duke Clark (6-2, 202, RFR); Evan Pryor (5-10, 190, RSR) WR: Vernell Brown III (5-11, 177, SO); Eric Singleton Jr. (5-10, 182, SR); Bailey Stockton (5-10, 182, RJR); Kahliel Jackson (6-3, 220, GR); Micah Mays Jr. (6-1, 195, RJR); TJ Abrams (5-10, 194, RSO) TE: Luke Harpring (6-3, 236, RSO); Lacota Dippre (6-3, 255, RJR); Evan Chieca (6-4, 257, RJR) LT: Eagan Boyer (6-8, 300, RSO) LG: Knijeah Harris (6-3, 317, SR) C: Harrison Moore (6-4, 300, JR); Jason Zandamela (6-3, 304, RSO) RG: TJ Shanahan Jr. (6-4, 311, RJR) RT: Emeka Ugorji (6-4, 311, SO)   THE STATE OF THE SEC A day after UCLA put a whomping on Dawn Staley and South Carolina for the NCAA women’s basketball championship, Michigan is heavily favored (7.5 or more points) to make it a clean sweep for the Big Ten by taking out UConn in the men’s NCAA championship game. UCLA’s national championship was the first for the Big Ten since Purdue in 1999. Should Michigan handle UConn, it will be the first championship for the Big Ten since Tom Izzo and Michigan State beat Florida in 2000.   Back in January, Indiana beat Miami to win the Big Ten’s third consecutive national championship.   The Big Ten’s recent dominance in football should be a major concern for Greg Sankey and the 16 schools that make up the Southeastern Conference. While it can be argued that the SEC is stronger from top to bottom than the Big Ten, nobody pays attention to how many 8-4 or 7-5 teams played in the Foghorn Leghorn or Chobani Greek Yogurt bowls. Public perception is formed by who’s at the top and for three straight years it’s been a Big Ten team. Making matters worse, no SEC team has even made it to the national championship game since Georgia annihilated TCU for the 2022 title.   Because there has been such a gap in basketball championships, it’s easy to write this off as merely a phase, but ESPN columnist Dan Wetzel warns that the Big Ten might be poised to dominate college basketball for years to come.   Writes Wetzel: “ Now that every school can pay players. – either through direct revenue share or via name, image and likeness dollars – Big Ten schools are no longer disadvantaged in recruiting by everything from booster bag men to shoe company AAU connections. ”   And let’s face it, the Big Ten is rolling in money these days starting with that massive media rights contract that involves Fox, CBS, NBC and the Big Ten Network. Although the SEC had more revenue for the 2024-25 fiscal year than the Big Ten – $1.03 billion to $928 million – the Big Ten is surging. It is estimated by some experts that we’re not far from a time when the Big Ten will be distributing more than $100 million per year to its 18 schools. Can the SEC, with its exclusive contract with ABC/Disney/ESPN/SEC Network keep up?   The demographics favor the Big Ten. Although the country is undergoing a significant population shift that sees the  states that make up the SEC growing rapidly, the Big Ten is coast-to-coast, stretching from metro New York City (Rutgers) to the left coast (UCLA, Southern Cal, Washington and Oregon). The combined population of the states that actually house a Big Ten school is approximately 138 million. The 11 states that make up the SEC have a combined population of approximately 107 million.   The living alumni base tilts significantly in the Big Ten’s favor. The five largest alumni bases in the country are Big Ten schools – Indiana, Penn State, Michigan, UCLA and Ohio State. Thirteen of the largest alumni bases are Big Ten schools. Only three SEC schools crack the top 25 – No. 6 Texas, No. 7 Texas A&M and No. 8 Florida.   So, how can the SEC at least stay on an eye-to-eye level with the Big Ten? It is possible, but it starts with putting winning products on the field that win championships in the most visible sports. The SEC will produce plenty of champions in the non-revenue sports, but the ones that matter most to the viewing public are football and men’s and women’s basketball. Winning championships will increase viewers and television ad revenues but Sankey and the SEC’s school presidents better bring in more corporate sponsorships.   If the SEC is to compete, it’s the only way.   ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: Remember not all that long ago when we had this rather Pollyanna notion that college sports were the last bastion of amateur athletics? The NCAA, in its infinite wisdom, tried to perpetuate the notion that because athletes were getting scholarships they shouldn’t get paid for the entertainment value they bring to campuses, communities, states and even the entire nation. Even though it got clobbered in court when it comes to paying athletes, the NCAA still tries to convince us that this amateur concept is what matters most.   Don’t believe it? Then watch tonight’s national championship game broadcast and more than once you’ll see the NCAA advertisement that goes something like this: 99 percent of all the college athletes will go pro in something other than sports. In other words, the elite athletes will get professional contracts but the bulk of the athletes are still amateurs.   That may be true down in Division II and Division III, but you probably were dropped on your head way too many times when you were an infant if you believe Division I players aren’t getting paid. They’ve always been paid only now it’s not under the table like it used to be. Now it’s legal.   The problem with today’s college sports isn’t so much that players are getting paid, it’s that there aren’t any guardrails in place. We hear that term “the wild, wild West” and it’s true. Athletes are for sale to the highest bidder which is why you have lawsuits like the one Trinidad Chambliss launched against the NCAA for a sixth year of eligibility. When the NCAA denied his request for a waiver, Chambliss went to court locally in Oxford and won. When the case moved to the Mississippi Supreme Court, Chambliss won again. The fight might continue in the courts, but odds are that Chambliss will be playing for Ole Miss in the fall, making more money as the Rebels starting quarterback than he would as a late round NFL backup … if that. Chambliss is listed at 6-1. Maybe in his cleats. Bare feet he’s maybe 5-10.   Mohammed Toure, a linebacker at Miami, will be back for an eighth season of college football in the fall. Somewhere in the Big Sky Conference there is a player who will be in his ninth year.   Eight years? Nine years?   Back in 1984 when Brigham Young won its only national championship in college football, the youngest player on its starting offensive line was 23 years old. Most were 25 or 26, married and with children. BYU gets a waiver for athletes who go on a 2-year Mormon mission. It’s strange that in 1992 the NCAA denied Florida defensive lineman Bill Gunter another year of eligibility because he spent a year working a local Christian mission that provided food and shelter for migrant farm workers.   Selective enforcement of rules has always been a staple of the NCAA. We could go on and on about the abuses and problems to which the NCAA has turned a blind eye, but we live in the here and now, and now prominent coaches are begging for something to be done. By and large, coaches aren’t against athletes being paid. They understand that at the Division I level, sports are a full time job. The kids should be paid. How much? That’s another story for another day, but they should be compensated for their time and work, particularly when considering many of the lingering injuries that shorten lifespans and affect long term quality of life.   It’s the transfer and eligibility rules that have turned so many players into hired guns, ready to bolt to the highest bidder. This also has changed recruiting. Instead of staking their livelihoods on young kids fresh out of high school, coaches are instead trying to cherry pick experienced players from the transfer portal.   On College Game Day Saturday, John Calipari said, “ I look at all this. I don't care the kids are making money. We just got to do a better job of transfers. Yeah, if a coach leaves or gets fired, you can leave without penalty. You can leave one time. I mean, I may even say two times, but you can't leave four times. You're not going to graduate. You're not going to create anything. You're a mercenary. Now, they'd say, well, they should be able to make money. Go pro! Let's worry about 17, 18, and 19-year-old kids. Just one thing. If it were your son, and he practiced, and he was a gym rat, he was all conference. He's not a top 50 player, but he's a Division I player. Right now, that kid is not getting contract or scholarship offers because we're all waiting on older players. The game is better because it's older – 25, 26. I laugh and say the guy got two kids and his wife and he's on his second wife. It's being a pro. It's what being a pro basketball player is.”   Last week Donald Trump signed an executive order that caps college eligibility at five years and allows one free transfer, the second transfer requiring an athlete to sit a year. The order also makes an effort to reel in collectives that are offering outrageous sums of money to athletes and it requires money being spent to further women’s and Olympic level sports.   This is a good start which is why coaches and administrators have hailed its significance. The next step needs to be a college sports commissioner because the NCAA has proven it's incapable of governing.

Not much but that’s not necessarily bad news     News was a little skimpy coming out of the Gator football scrimmage Saturday,  which is not necessarily a bad thing just a week before the spring game. If there was anything disastrous we would have heard about it. Otherwise there were the usual dribs and drabs about the quarterback competition. Next up will be how the squad is split and which injured players are back on the field for the Orange and Blue game. We do know that dazzling WR Dallas Wilson is back to running and expected to be seen on the field and limited action. His return has been widely anticipated ever since his first career game, when Wilson logged six catches for 111 yards and two touchdowns against No. 9 Texas before being injured. However, as Coach John Sumrall says “I already know what he can do.“ It will also be our first look at wide receiver transfer sensation, Eric Singletary and will get to see cornerback Dijon Johnson back in action. There are not expected to be a ton of surprises, but we will see some wrinkles that we like, or maybe don’t like, and experience the overall operation of this new coach, and his coaching staff with new players, which has already creating a buzz around the SEC. There’s a lot of curiosity, and not just by the Gator nation.   SHORT STUFF: Left Over Hoopla   —If accurately quoted this sounds promising and it makes you wonder what he knows that he hasn’t told us yet: Todd Golden projects Florida to be ranked in the top 15 at the start of next season, but a top 10 team if “some things swing our way.”   —Say what you will about the previous basketball coach, but he had an eyeball for coaching talent. Dusty May was a assistant at Florida under Mike White from 2015 to 2018 then he takes a team to the national championship game in his 2nd year. Plus took FAU to the final 4 .   —Rueben Chinyelu is the first Naismith Defensive Player of the Year award winner born outside the United States.   —Coach Todd Golden praised his time on @coachbrucepearl's staff. "You can't fake caring about people."     Tough Gator Baseball Loss Ole Miss scored five in the ninth to beat No. 14 Florida in Gainesville after having the Rebels in the ropes after the heretofore strong bullpen fell apart and won the series. Florida hasn't won back-to-back series Kennesaw State and Miami in late February.   Yeah, It Was Classless By Geno.   And This Is Insane:   In order for NFL fans to watch every football game next season you will need TEN different streaming subscriptions. • Netflix • Prime Video • NFL Network • Peacock/NBC • FOX • CBS • ESPN+ • Paramount+ • YouTube TV • NFL Sunday Ticket   Agree with this guy on TwitterX: I will die on the hill that major sports championships belong on broadcast TV. Put early round leftovers on whatever the hell truTV is. The Final Four belongs on CBS where the entire country can watch. And Finally, From Scott on Twitter: I miss the days where the Final Four was "play the first semifinal, let teams warm up for the second one and let's play ball." This between games concert stuff now is stupid and pointless. Me: Amen Scott

Florida gymnastics stays hot as the Gators put up another massive 198+ score for the fifth time in five meets. #3 Florida, # 6 Georgia, # 11 Michigan State and #14 California were looking to finish in the top two to advance to Nationals and UF brought it again scoring a 198.050. With Georgia advancing with an impressive 197.750 advancing for the first time since 2019. It’s on to Fort Worth April, 16th in the evening session. With the top four scores of the day will advance to the Final Four on Saturday April, 18th. LSU and Oklahoma are the favorites but the Gators have something to say about who will hold the trophy. LSU advanced with a 197.225 out of the Lexington Regional. Big news out of that meet was the loss of star Konnor McClain from a Bars injury Six gymnasts competed, with Florida having the choice of rotation of Vault, Uneven Bars, Balance Beam and Floor Routine. The Five highest scores count. On to the recap: Vault: Regional Semifinals: 49.600. Average: 49.256, 9th in the Nation. Georgia: Average: 49.323, 5th in the nation. Michigan State: 49.264, 7th in the nation. California: 49.055, 21st in the nation. -Anya Pilgrim: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Hop forward.- 9.850 (The dropped score) -Skylar Drasser: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Step forward.- 9.850 -eMjae Frazier: Yurchenko Double. Twisting to face the Vault. Small hop.- 9.850 -Kayla DiCello: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Hop forward- 9.90 -Danie Ferris: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Hop on landing- 9.875 -Selena Harris-Miranda: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Small hop.- 9.90 49.375 - Above average here. Only Georgia with a 49.425 on Vault outscored the Gators. UGA-49.525 on a nice Bars routine, MSU-49.375 and Cal-49.025. Puts Florida tied for second after the first rotation. Uneven Bars: Regional Semifinals: 49.625. Average, 49.586, 1st in the Nation. Georgia: 49.345, 7th nationally. Michigan State: 49.233, 13th nationally. California: 49.332, 8th nationally. -eMjae Frazier: Low bar mount. Legs slightly separated. Double layout dismout. Stuck- 9.875 -Anya Pilgrim: Low bar mount. Legs together. Full twisting double tuck dismount. Stuck- 9.925 -Skye Blakely: Springboard mount. Extra long handstands. A little crooked on her motions. Inverted grip to a double half twist dismount. Stuck.- 9.950. Almost back-to-back 10’s! -Kayla DiCello: Springboard high bar mount. Legs together. Twisting layout dismount. Hop- 9.850 (The dropped score) -Selena Harris-Miranda: Top bar mount.High bar to low bar into a handstand. Pointed toes! Double layout dismount. Stuck- 9.90 Riley McCusker: Low Bar mount. Smooth routine. Great low to high bar transition. Double tuck dismount. Stuck- 9.925 49.575 - Again, Florida just pulls away from teams in the Bars. Highest total on Bars tonight. Florida takes first place. 98.950, UGA-98.775, MSU-98.700 and Cal-98.450 after two rotations. Beam: Regional Semifinals: 49.450. Average: 49.536, 1st in the Nation. Georgia: 49.286, 8th nationally. Michigan State: 49.208, 13th nationally. California: 49.070, 19th nationally. -Skylar Drasser:  Double series. 360 turn. Twisting front dismount 1 1/2 twist. Stuck- 9.90 -Alyssa Arana: Double back handspring. Wobble Front leap. Gainer Full side dismount. Takes a step - 9.725 (The dropped score) The only sub 9.8 of the whole weekend for the Gators. That’s good folks! -Skye Blakely: Triple wolf turn. Front to back handspring. Gainer full twisting side dismount. Stuck - 9.90 -eMjae Frazier: Springboard mount. Front flip to back flip arial. 360 turn. Split jumps. Cartwheel to twisting dismount. Stuck.-9.90 -Kayla DiCello: Springboard candle mount. Wolf turn. Double back a handspring. Front arial. Side dismount. Stuck.- 9.925 -Selena Harris-Miranda: Side split mount. Triple series back handspring. 360 turn. Front twisting dismount. Stuck.- 9.925 49.550 - Florida has the top five scores on Beam for the competition. Florida leads 148.500. UGA-148.325, MSU-148.075 and Cal-147.600 after the third rotation. Floor: Regional Semifinals: 49.450. Average: 49.436, 6th in the Nation. Georgia: 49.493, 3rd nationally. Michigan State: 49.394, 10th nationally. California: 49.230, 20th nationally. -Gabby Disidore: 1st pass (The long runs from corner to corner)- Double layout into a leap. Hop. 180 degree jumps. 2nd pass- Front twisting layout. Stuck.- 9.850 -Danie Ferris: 1st- Double tuck flip layout. Foot adjustment. 2nd- Combination twisting layout into a jump. Knees buckled on landing-9.80 (The dropped score) -Amelia Disidore: 1st- Front double layout. Foot slide. 2nd- Front twisting jump into a leap. Stuck- 9.850 -eMjae Frazier: 1st- Front double tuck flip. Foot slide. 2nd- Double front flip. Stuck.- 9.925 Skye Blakely: 1st- Front handspring. Double flip to stag leap. 2nd-Huge leaps. Front twisting combination pass. Stuck- 9.950 -Selena Harris-Miranda: 1st- Front double tuck. Stuck. 2nd- Combination pass to stag leap- 9.975. When will they score Selena a 10? Come on! Maybe Nationals? 49.450- The 198 streak was in jeopardy until eMjae, Skye and Selena closed out with huge scores on the floor.  Florida is first at 198.050. Georgia is second at 197.750. Michigan State is third at 197.00 and California is fourth at 196.975 Lily Bruce and Selena Harris-Miranda celebrate a Gator 198 score. (Photo UAA) Event winners: Vault:     CaMarah Williams, Georgia- 9.925 Bars:      Autumn Reingold, UGA, Nikki Smith, MSU- 9.975 Beam:    Kayla DiCello, Florida and Selena Harris-Miranda, Florida- 9.925 Floor:     Selena Harris-Miranda, Florida- 9.975 All-Around:         Nikki Smith, MSU 39.725. Selena Harris-Miranda, 2nd- 39.700 After the meet eMjae Frazier about being a Gator for her Senior season: “I could just say coming here has been such a change in my life and I have my built-in best friends, built-in sisters on this team and it’s just amazing to go out here and compete freely with so much fun and confidence in each other. We stay present with each other. We just go out there and be us and do everything that we do in practice and you can see it this week. "Our word was unbreakable and I think we can show you just now we did today and on Thursday the Gators are unbreakable and honestly, they’ve changed my life so much. I feel so valued. I feel so just blessed and honored to be a part of Gator Nation, the Gator community in general. It’s so great. I love being a Florida Gator.” . There’s no argument the top gymnast in the nation is LSU’s Kaitlin Chio. It’s hard to argue that the Gators are not the top team right now, when it counts.

Is it possible that Tommy Haugh could be back for one more year (Photo by Chris Spears) A few thoughts to jump start your Sunday morning: What Patric Young suggested last week on Jacksonville radio station 1010XL should not only send shivers up and down the spine of every coach in the Southeastern Conference but every coach whose team might have to face the Florida Gators on the basketball court next season.   Young, formerly the SEC’s Defensive Player of the Year and now a basketball analyst for the SEC Network, suggested that Todd Golden might not have to replace his entire front line after all. Tommy Haugh is projected to go somewhere between 12 and 16 in the NBA Draft. Neither Alex Condon nor Rueben Chinyelu have elbowed their way into first round talk. Additionally, Micah Handlogten continues to wait for the NCAA to rule on his waiver request that will grant him one more season of collegiate eligibility.   When asked about Florida’s front line next season, Young offered this response: “Very likely you can see all three guys come back … High chance that all three of these guys make a decision and you know I think it's obvious more likely that you see Condon and Chinyelu back. But Tommy Haugh, a great chance that he's back. I mean he loves being a Gator. He's being compensated well … I don't think he can hurt his draft stock. He's going to be a professional. He's going to be in the NBA regardless.”   Young spoke in a casual but rather matter-of-fact manner. Is he in the know or was it simply speculation or wishful thinking on his part?   It has been expected that Condon and Chinyelu might be returning. As second round selections in the NBA Draft it’s unlikely they would get multi-year contracts with guaranteed money. If they were to return to Florida to play their senior seasons, they would, in all probability, make more money than they would as a second rounder on an NBA roster or with a 2-way contract that would involve the bulk of their time playing in the G-League. At Florida Condon and Chinyelu would likely make in excess of $2 million each.   The wild card in this scenario is Haugh, who is currently projected to go in the lottery. Would he turn down life-changing money to return to Florida? That’s what it would take if he were to return to UF, but it wouldn’t be the first time future Gator lottery picks said no to the NBA for one more season in Gainesville. After the Gators won their first NCAA title back in 2006, Joakim Noah, Al Horford and Corey Brewer were all projected to go in the NBA Draft lottery. All three said no, returned to Florida to play one more season with Taurean Green and Lee Humphrey in the starting lineup. After winning the 2007 NCAA title, Noah, Horford and Brewer all left for the NBA and all three were taken in the lottery.   “I’m so proud of that group,” Noah said Saturday while appearing on College Game Day. “We won the first one, had an opportunity to go to the NBA and we decided to come back because we loved playing with each other and our group was so tight.”   It was a group decision to return for a chance to win a second straight NCAA title. The decision was made, Noah said, after visiting Brewer at his home in Portland, Tennessee. Noah and Horford were from families with means, but Brewer was from more modest circumstances and his father suffered long term effects of diabetes.   “When I went to Portland, Tennessee and I saw where Corey was from and when he said, ‘I’m coming back to school and I want you guys to come with me,’ and we’ve got to do this together … When I saw where he was from and for him to say no to the money, it said everything. Even our press conference (in 2007) when we declared for the draft, it was a sad day. That’s how much we loved hooping with each other … People always underestimate chemistry and loving to hoop with each other. It’s rare.”   The chemistry among Florida’s big guys is rare, too. Haugh, Condon and Handlogten have been together for three years. Haugh and Condon were rather obscure recruits coming out of high school (Haugh in Pennsylvania; Condon in Australia). Handlogten was a transfer from Marshall. Chinyelu became an indispensable member of the group a year later when he transferred in from Washington State.   If Haugh, Condon and Chinyelu left for the NBA and Handlogten’s waiver request was rejected, Todd Golden would have a massive front court rebuild on his hands. If all four return, Florida will almost certainly be in everybody’s preseason top 10 and Haugh, a second team All-America selection, would be a candidate for SEC and national player of the year. Chinyelu is the 2026 Naismith National Defensive Player of the Year and Condon will be a 3-year starter. Handlogten is working to return to the form he displayed as a sophomore when he was a starter prior to fracturing his leg in the SEC Tournament championship game with Auburn.   If only Condon and Chinyelu return, Florida will be formidable next season, but all four? If that were to happen a lot of experts would pencil Florida in as a team that could win its second NCAA title in three years.     GATORS ADVANCE TO NCAA GYMNASTICS CHAMPIONSHIPS It’s off to Fort Worth for the NCAA Championships after Florida’s 3 rd -ranked gymnastics team won the Tempe Regional Saturday night with a score of 198.050, a full .300 ahead of second place Georgia (197.750). It marked the fifth consecutive meet in which the Gators have scored 198 or better, a school record.   Ensuring victory for Florida was the final three in the floor rotation. After eMjae Frazier scored a 9.925, Skye Blakely followed with a 9.95 and Selena Harris-Miranda closed things out with a 9.975, a career-best on floor. Harris-Miranda had 9.9s for both the vault and bars and a 9.925 on the balance beam leading up to her floor routine.   Harris-Miranda competed in the all-around, scoring a 39.70 while Frazier scored 39.55   It marked the 23 rd regional championship for the Gators who are seeking to win their first NCAA title since the third of the 2012-14 three-peat.   UCONN, MICHIGAN WILL PLAY FOR NCAA TITLE MONDAY NIGHT Based on their total destruction of Arizona in the Saturday night semifinals, Michigan is already established as 7.5-point favorites to win the Big Ten’s first NCAA basketball championship since Michigan State did it back in 2000. Even with Yaxel Lendeborg limited to 14 minutes due to an ankle sprain, the Wolverines demolished Arizona, 91-74, to advance to the championship game against UConn, which advanced to the championship game by beating Illinois, 71-62.   ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: Although the NCAA transfer portal for college basketball doesn’t open until Tuesday, already 29 Southeastern Conference players have let it be known they’re shopping for a new place to play basketball. Once the clock strikes midnight after Monday’s NCAA championship game between UConn and Michigan, all hell is going to break loose and we can anticipate a couple thousand at a bare minimum will state their willingness to participate in what is nothing more than a glorified cattle auction.   The portal stays open for 15 days but the negotiations will go on long afterward. Let’s not fool ourselves here. Sure, there are players who will transfer out in search of playing time who aren’t in it for the money. We’ll know that because they’ll be transferring to a Division I school that lacks the financial resources to fork out money to pay players.   Then you have the power conferences. Last year Kentucky spent $22 million for a roster that lost 14 games and couldn’t get past the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament. All that money couldn’t turn the Wildcats into contenders. Rather than re-evaluate and try to piece together a new roster with more efficient use of money, it is rumored that Kentucky will throw stacks of money into the raging fire, raising the ante by another $2-3 million … more if necessary. Not only has it been 14 years since the last Kentucky national championship, it has been since 2019 that the Wildcats made it to the Elite Eight game and 2015 since making it to the Final Four.   Kentucky’s not alone. If you’re a power conference school and you aren’t buying players out of the transfer portal then you’re in danger of falling so far behind that your school will never compete for championships. This is why you’ll see schools desperate enough to sign players who are on their third or fourth transfer. John Calipari calls them mercenaries and for all practical purposes that’s exactly what they are.   You can’t really blame the athletes. They’re taking advantage of a spineless NCAA which (a) has very few rules or guardrails in place and (b) lacks the fortitude to enforce what rules there are. Rather than come up with a set of rules that can be enforced to put an end to all this nonsense, the NCAA’s solution is to go to Congress hat in hand begging for people who can’t keep the government open and pay employees essential to our safety to put some antitrust legislation in place that will protect their billion-dollar industry.   On College Game Day Saturday, Jay Bilas said, “If we want players to stay, then sign them to long-term contracts and put buyouts in them, but the NCAA doesn't want to do that because they don't want them to be employees. They want to beg Congress for an antitrust exemption. And they're not going to get it. What other multibillion dollar industry is getting an antitrust exemption from Congress? There isn't one. What the NCAA should do is make rules that don't violate federal law. The rest of the rest of American business has to do it. They can do it, too.”   Although this is basketball’s big weekend, the same questions and circumstances ring true with football and to a lesser extent the non-revenue sports. Miami played for the college football championship with a $4 million transfer QB (Carson Beck). Are you naïve enough to think the money isn’t flowing to baseball, softball and other sports? Texas Tech softball pitcher NiJaree Canady was paid more than a million dollars to bolt Stanford for scenic Lubbock and its many thousands of rattlesnakes and scorpions. Canady got Texas Tech to its first Women’s College World Series in Oklahoma City last year.     The NCAA could put an end to this nonsense but when has it ever come up with practical solutions that are legal? The NCAA is what happens when you put academics in charge of running a business that rakes in billions. College sports are in the process of being destroyed by clueless people who have never run a business their entire lives. What have they given us?  No rules. No solutions. Just chaos, which is what is about to be unleashed once again within an hour or so of the UConn-Michigan game.

(Photo by Chris Spears) A few thoughts to jump start your Saturday morning: He hasn’t coached his first football game yet, but Jon Sumrall has already changed perceptions about Florida football. We have a four-year sample size of what Billy Napier was like as the Gators’ head coach. Perceptions are that Napier was a thoughtful, caring coach, outstanding from Sunday through Friday, but not so good on Saturday. Napier tried to go about his business quietly, attempting to build a boy scout culture in the football program.   It seems Napier never embraced the fact that if you’re going to win football games in the Southeastern Conference you do it with a handful of boy scouts and a majority of borderline psychopaths. This is a violent game that we’re talking about and the schools that consistently win big are the ones whose locker rooms are filled with people willing to act out their brutal fantasies on a football field. Too many boy scouts and you’ve got Wake Forest.   Laid back just doesn’t cut it which is why Billy Napier finds himself back in the Sun Belt coaching James Madison.   The sample size we have of Jon Sumrall in just four months is the antithesis of Napier. He’s transparent. He’s vocal. He is non-stop energy from can-to-can’t every day. He understands what it takes to win at Florida. He cares about his players but ask him if he wants to be their buddy, he’ll respond in a hurry that he doesn’t really care if his players like him or not. He only cares if they respect him enough to channel their energy to develop the kind of habits that will translate into winning football games on Saturday.   During his playing days at Kentucky, Sumrall was a fierce linebacker who was that unchained borderline psychopath on the field for 60 minutes of game time and every day in practice. He understands the mentality it takes to win because he’s lived it both as a player and as a head coach where his teams have made the conference championship game four times in four years, winning three. He was in charge of instilling the winning attitude in players while at the same time allowing his coaches to coach. He doesn’t call plays. He leaves that to his coaches but holds them and his players accountable.   In four months on the job Sumrall has changed perceptions. It shows on the recruiting trail where Florida is a hot ticket item this year. It shows with the way his style has been embraced by the two most successful football coaches in UF history, Steve Spurrier and Urban Meyer.   Sumrall has a little less than five months before he coaches his first game but there are obvious signs of respect from the national and southern media. People are noticing. Perceptions are changing. It’s too early to say the corner has been turned and Florida football is back, but one thing for certain, no one is calling the coach or the Florida Gators laid back these days. FINAL FOUR PREDICTIONS Illinois (28-8/South) vs. UConn (33-5/East): When the brackets came out, everybody penciled in Florida vs. Duke for this one. Well, a funny thing happened on the way to the semifinals. Florida never made it out of the first weekend and Duke blew a 19-point lead against UConn. In Florida’s place we have Illinois, the tallest team in the country that plays at a frenetic pace. In Duke’s place, we have UConn, looking for its third national title in four years and sixth since 1999. For the Illini to win they have to force UConn to play an up and down game, plus they have to make threes. For UConn to win, the pace has to slow down considerably and Tarris Reed Jr. has to stay out of foul trouble. Illinois comes to this game hoping to win. UConn comes to this game knowing they will win. Prediction: UConn   Michigan (35-3/Midwest) vs. Arizona (36-2/West): Former Florida assistant Dusty May is in his second final four in just eight seasons as a head coach since he left Mike White’s Florida staff after the 2018 season. When you can take Florida Atlantic to a Final Four, you can flat out coach. The Michigan team he brings to this game is big, deep and talented. He’s got the best player in the country in Yaxel Lendeborg and a point guard in Elliott Cadeau who has exceeded all expectations. The Wolverines have a search and destroy mentality. How will that translate against Arizona, which can match the Michigan size and surpass the Wolverines when it comes to physicality? What makes Arizona so scary is Tommy Lloyd starts three freshmen and his most dangerous player – Tobe Awaka – comes off the bench. Awaka plays like he’s the heavyweight champion of the world. If Awaka has a fine game and Braden Burries doesn’t get the freshman yips then Arizona can and will win this game. Michigan has to make threes which Zona defends well. Zona can win without threes because the Wildcats can get what they want in the paint. Prediction: Arizona   MONEY DON’T MATTER 2 NIGHT North Carolina made a Godfather offer to Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd and Lloyd just said no, instead signing a 5-year extension that will pay him $7.5 million per year to stay at Zona. Carolina offered Bill Self money – Self makes about $2 million more than the $8.8 million that is often reported – but Lloyd took less money to stay at Arizona where he is 148-35 in five years on the job. In the immortal words of Prince, “Money don’t matter 2 night; it sure didn’t matter yesterday.”   Lloyd has a good gig going at Arizona where he can recruit nationally and whose Tucson campus is a quick hop from the fertile recruiting grounds of San Diego and Los Angeles. Arizona will never compete with the big boys in football where you have to recruit 25-30 studs a year, but in hoops where 2-3 a year can make a difference, he can easily maintain the winning standards.   With Lloyd out of the Carolina picture, all eyes turn to Michigan coach Dusty May and Chicago Bulls coach Billy Donovan. May makes more than $4 million at Michigan and Donovan is in the second year of a 4-year deal at Chicago that pays him $6 million. If May wins the national championship Michigan would look very foolish letting him leave over money so expect May to get a matching offer to stay. Donovan loves coaching in the NBA but he’s with an organization that seems clueless when it comes to building a roster that can contend. It will probably take $10 million to lure him to Chapel Hill.   Prediction: Billy returns to college coaching in Chapel Hill and immediately restores the Carolina brand.   PEAKING AT JUST THE RIGHT TIME Jenny Rowland has Florida’s gymnastics team peaking at just the right time. Thursday night the Gators scored a 198.125 at the Tempe NCAA Regional, a full 1.45 points ahead of second place California. That might sound like a narrow win, but 1.45 points in gymnastics is like the Florida football team winning by 63 points. Third place Penn State and fourth place Arizona State were so far behind you’d have to send a search and rescue team to find them.   The Gators will be facing off with Georgia (197.125), Michigan State (197.35) and California (196.675) tonight with the top two advancing to the NCAA championship meet in Fort Worth in two weeks. Custer had a better chance of beating Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse than these three teams have of beating the Gators. They will be battling it out to be the second team from the Tempe Regional to advance.   In winning Thursday night, the Gators posted their fourth consecutive score of 198 or higher. Florida already owns the highest score of the year for the entire nation, the 198.575 the Gators scored to win the SEC meet.   The Gators are healthy and have momentum on their side as they try to bring home Florida’s first gymnastics national title since the third of the back-to-back-to-backs in 2014. Thursday night, Skye Blakely scored a 10 on the balance beam and Selena Harris-Miranda won the all-around with a 39.825.   It is entirely possible that six SEC teams will advance to the eight-team NCAA championships – Florida, Oklahoma, LSU, Alabama, Arkansas and Georgia.   SEC BASKETBALL IN THE TRANSFER PORTAL Arkansas Karter Knox (6-6, 211, SO)   Florida Olivier Rioux (7-9, 305, RFR )   Georgia Jeremiah Wilkinson (6-1, 185, SO); Dylan James (6-9, 235, JR); Somto Cyril (6-11, 260, SO); Jackson McVey (7-1, 240, FR)   Kentucky Jaland Lowe (6-2, 170, JR); Brandon Garrison (6-11, 245, JR); Jasper Johnson (6-5, 180, FR)   LSU Dedan Thomas Jr. (6-1, 178, JR); Jalen Reed (6-10, 230, SR); Mazi Mosley (6-5, 169, FR); Matt Gilhool (6-11, 213, FR); Ron Zipper (6-5, 209, FR)   Mississippi State Jamarion Davis-Fleming (6-10, 240, FR); Dellquan Warren (6-1, 160, FR)   Missouri Anthony Robinson II (6-2, 175, JR); Sebastian Mack (6-3, 195, JR)   Ole Miss Eduardo Klafke (6-5, 190, SO); Ilias Kamardine (6-5, 185, FR); Hobert Grayson IV (6-4, 205, SR) South Carolina Eli Ellis (6-0, 192, FR); Elijah Strong (6-8, 225, JR); EJ Walker (6-7, 253, FR); Jordan Butler (7-0, 240, JR)   Tennessee Tyler Lundblade (6-5, 195, SR, from Belmont); Cade Phillips (6-9, 212, JR) Vanderbilt Frankie Collins (6-1, 185, SR)   ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: Pat Summit is rolling over in her grave today. Trust me on this one. I endured the two games of the women’s NCAA semifinals Friday night. When the horn sounded to end the second game sometime around midnight it was merciful. How many layups and shots from point blank range were missed? Watching 3-point shooting was like the SCUD-missile attacks from Saddam Hussein back in the day when we got nightly play-by-play of Gulf Wars one and two from Baghdad Bob. Countless unforced turnovers. Horrendously bad officiating that made it seem as if we were watching re-runs of Championship Wrestling from Florida. Instead of Gordon Solie on the mic we were forced to listen to Rebecca Lobo’s incessantly dull analysis.     They tried to explain away the boredom of South Carolina’s win over previously unbeaten UConn and UCLA’s win over Texas as great defense. If they had told the truth they would have chalked this up to bad basketball.   Very bad basketball.   How bad was it? Bad enough that it wiped out the excitement that Caitlyn Clark infused into women’s college basketball a couple of years ago. Caitlyn made the women’s game exciting and fun to watch. She made shots. She made teammates better. She made the women’s game must see TV. What we saw Friday night was dull, boring basketball that the commentators attempted to sell as defensive brilliance but instead it was two games that set the women’s game back years and years.   Pat Summit rolls over in her grave as we speak.   Having watched both games without falling asleep thanks to coffee, which I never drink at night unless I’m driving, the pick for the Sunday championship game is South Carolina over UCLA and it won’t be close. Dawn Staley’s team will turn the game into a steel cage match and the Gamecocks will win their fourth NCAA championship in six years. It will be tough. It will be physical. It will be the kind of basketball that won’t excite anyone except South Carolina fans, who appreciate that Staley owns half (three) of the NCAA championships won by the entire athletic department in school history.

Coach Rowland decides to let the depth of this team shine and have only Selena Harris-Miranda compete in the  All-Around. Florida scores its nation leading-fourth straight 198+ to easily advance to the second round of the Regional Gymnastics in Tempe, AZ. #3 Florida joined #14 California, #20 Penn State and #32 Arizona State. With the top two team scores qualifying to meet #6 Georgia (197.125) and #11 Michigan State (197.350) that competed earlier in the day for a showdown on Saturday. Florida comes into the post season with four All-Americans. Skye Blakely (Uneven Bars, Balance Beam), Kayla DiCello (Uneven Bars, Balance Beam), Selena Harris-Miranda (All-Around, Vault, Uneven Bars and Balance Beam), and Riley McCusker (UB) earned a combined total of nine Women’s Collegiate Gymnastics Association (WCGA) regular-season All-America honors – including anational high eight first-team accolades. This is the 14th year the WCGA has recognized regular season All-Americans. Florida is peaking at the best time of the year. LSU earlier scored a 198.375 in their Regional and Oklahoma competes late on Friday. Regardless the four 198’s is a big deal. There are still areas where you can see points given away but with the Gators hitting on Vault. Look out LSU and Oklahoma. Florida outscored them at the SEC’s and can do the same in Fort Worth on April 16th. They just have one more night to advance. Finish in the top two Saturday at 8pm EST and it’s off to Nationals. Pace was the plan Friday. With four All-Arounds in the SEC Championship. Coach Rowland decided to let the depth of this team shine and have only Selena Harris-Miranda compete in the  All-Around. Six gymnasts competed, with Florida having the choice of rotation of Vault, Uneven Bars, Balance Beam and Floor Routine. The Five highest scores count. On to the recap: Vault: SEC Championship: 49.425. Average: 49.256, 9th in the Nation. California: Average: 49.055, 21st in the nation. Penn State: 49.028, 23rd in the nation. Arizona State: 48.938, 27th in the nation. -Anya Pilgrim: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Small hop forward.- 9.90 -Skylar Drasser: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Tiny foot slide.- 9.90 -eMjae Frazier: Yurchenko Double. Twisting to face the Vault. Small hop.- 9.875 (The dropped score) -Kayla DiCello: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Stuck landing- 9.950 Kayla has scored 9.9+ on 15 of 17 of her last routines. -Danie Ferris: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Legs wide on landing. Arm swing- 9.875 -Selena Harris-Miranda: Yurchenko 1 1/2. Stuck.- 9.975 49.600 - Wow! Florida’s highest score all season. A weakness early in the season seems to have turned around the last few weeks. Cal-49.200, Penn St-49.150 and ASU-49.100. With Florida’s toughest event out of the way. The other teams are just playing for second place now after just one rotation. Skye Blakely picks up a perfect 10 on Bars. (Photo UAA) Uneven Bars: SEC Championship: 49.800. Average, 49.586, 1st in the Nation. California: 49.332, 8th nationally. Penn State: 49.243, 11th nationally. Arizona State: 48.773, 41st nationally. -eMjae Frazier: Low bar mount. Legs slightly separated. Double layout dismout. Stuck- 9.850 -Anya Pilgrim: Low bar mount. Legs together. Full twisting double tuck dismount. Hop- 9.800 (The dropped score) -Skye Blakely: Springboard mount. Extra long handstands. A little crooked on her motions. Inverted grip to a double half twist dismount. Stuck.- 10.0! A bit of a surprise here, to be honest. -Kayla DiCello: Springboard high bar mount. Legs together. Twisting layout dismount. Hop backward- 9.875. -Selena Harris-Miranda: Top bar mount.High bar to low bar into a handstand. Extra, extra long handstands! Double layout dismount. Small foot slide- 9.975 Riley McCusker: Low Bar mount. Toes pointed. Great low to high bar transition. Double tuck dismount. Small hop- 9.925 49.625 - A slow start on the bars ends strong! Florida takes a huge lead. 99.225, Cal-98.250, PSU-98.175 and ASU-98.075 after two rotations. Beam: SEC Championship: 49.525. Average: 49.536, 1st in the Nation. California: 49.070, 19th nationally. Penn State: 49.078, 18th nationally. Arizona State: 48.823, 33rd nationally. -Skylar Drasser:  Double series. 360 turn. Twisting front dismount 1 1/2 twist. Steps backwards- 9.825 -Alyssa Arana: Double back handspring. Front leap. Gainer Full side dismount. Stuck - 9.90. UF needs Alyssa in the postseason on this routine to hit. Great to see a 9.9 here. -Skye Blakely: Triple wolf turn. Front to back handspring. Gainer full twisting side dismount. Swinging arms on the landing - 9.875 -eMjae Frazier: Springboard mount. Front flip to back flip. Big balance check. Split jumps. Cartwheel to twisting dismount. Stuck.-9.800 (The dropped score) Back to back weeks with a miss here. -Kayla DiCello: Springboard candle mount. Wolf turn. Double back a handspring. Front arial. Side dismount. Stuck.- 9.90 -Selena Harris-Miranda: Side split mount. Triple series back handspring. 360 turn. Front twisting dismount. Stuck.- 9.950. 49.450 - A bit under their average but a good score. Florida leads 148.675, Cal-147.625, ASU-147.050 and PSU-146.975 after the third rotation. Floor: SEC Championship: 49.425. Average: 49.436, 6th in the Nation. California: 49.230, 20th nationally. Penn State: 49.158, 26th nationally. Arizona State: 49.115, 30th nationally. -Gabby Disidore: 1st pass (The long runs from corner to corner)- Double layout into a leap. Stuck. 180 degree jumps. 2nd pass- Front twisting flip. Stuck.- 9.875 -Danie Ferris: 1st- Double tuck flip. 2nd- Combination twisting layout into a jump. Hop-9.850 -Jayla Booker: 1st- Tuck flip. Small hop. 2nd- Double front flip. Hop. Good to see Jayla get a shot in Regionals.- 9.80 (The dropped score) -Amelia Disidore: 1st- Front double layout. Stuck. 2nd- Front twisting jump into a leap. Stuck- 9.90 Skye Blakely: 1st- Front handspring. Double flip to stag leap. 2nd-Huge leaps. Front twisting combination pass. Stuck- 9.90 -Selena Harris-Miranda: 1st- Front double tuck. Stuck. 2nd- Combination pass to stag leap- 9.925. Still a 10 away on Floor from the Gym Slam. 49.450- Florida again gets stronger at the end of the event securing the elusive 198! A bit of a rest for Skye, Kayla and eMjae. Florida is first at 198.125. California advances at 196.675. Penn State is eliminated at 196.200 and Arizona State has a short drive home with a 196.050. Selena Harris-Miranda after the meet: “We have so much fun together and I think it just strengthen our bonds and strengthen everybody and our relationship with each other so that is definitely helped us. I’m just super proud that we came out of here and just felt free and relaxed and we did everything that we talked about during the weekend and we’re just we’re ready to bring that into the day two. It’s gonna be a challenging weekend. We already warned everybody about that but we’ve done a really good job of keeping our head down and doing our job stuff all the time so it was great.”

Have the Gators ever had a better late game closer than Walter Clayton Jr. (Photo by Chris Spears) Of the eight games the Gators lost last season, seven were by a combined 25 points: Arizona (6), TCU (4), Duke (1), UConn (4), Missouri (2), Auburn (7) and Iowa (1). The other loss was to Vanderbilt (17). Arizona and UConn are in the Final Four and it’s possible they could meet for the national championship on Monday. Duke and Iowa made the Elite Eight. TCU and Missouri made the NCAA Tournament as did Vanderbilt. Auburn plays tonight in the NIT semifinals. Not a cheap loss to a bad team in the bunch.   When the Gators won the 2025 national championship, they were the undisputed kings of close call wins and comebacks. Last year’s team was unfazed by white knuckles circumstances in the final minutes of a game. Comebacks? They were the comeback kids. In the NCAA Tournament alone they came back from 10 with 7:47 to go to beat Texas Tech in the Elite Eight game in San Francisco. In the semifinals, they were down 12 in the second half to No.1 overall seed Auburn. In the championship game, Houston had the Gators by 12 and on the ropes in the second half. The Gators beat Texas Tech by five, Auburn by six and Houston by two. During the regular season, the Gators came from 14 down in the final minutes for a 1-point win over South Carolina. The Gators led that one by all of 43 seconds. In Athens, the Gators trailed Georgia by 25 points in the first half, but rallied to take the lead in the final two minutes only to give out of gas.   It could be argued that this year’s Florida team could have and should have beaten Arizona, TCU, Duke, UConn, Missouri and Iowa. Defeat was snatched from the jaws of victory in those six. The Gators probably could have won the Auburn game but they never seemed in synch the entire 40 minutes. Still, a shot here, a shot there, one or two fewer turnovers and a stop or two and that’s a win. Vandy? Forget about it. For reasons no one can pinpoint, the Gators were a no show that game.   So what was the difference? Why is it the 2025 national championship team was aces at clutch your pearls and take a deep breath time and this year’s team found creative ways to wilt when it mattered?   The best argument that can be made is the 2025 team had three guys – Walter Clayton Jr., Will Richard and Alijah Martin – who not only wanted to take the shots that mattered but wanted to guard the guys on the other team who take the big shots when the clock was winding down toward all zeroes. Walt gets well-deserved credit for his shot making in big games, but he was a far better defender than anyone wants to give him credit for. Just ask Emanuel Sharp of Houston. Richard made the shot that beat South Carolina, but he also made huge defensive plays in the Auburn and Houston Final Four wins. His offense carried the Gators until they mounted the comeback against Houston. Martin was an in your face defender who had a habit of showing up where the ball was and turning it into much needed points. The dunk against UConn and the burst of speed dunk late against Auburn come to mind.   Alijah Martin's dunk on UConn helped seal the deal last year (Photo by Chris Spears) Those guys were unafraid of big moments, no matter which end of the court they were playing. That’s partly because what is in their DNA but also because experience taught them how to handle difficult late game situations. The hearts of Clayton, Richard and Martin might have felt ready to explode out the chest and stick to the nearest wall, but you would have never known it by outward appearance. And you would have never known it by late game performances. Those three were closers, among the best we've seen in college basketball in a number of years. What the Gators lacked this year were closers.   Now, this is not to insinuate that any of the 2025-26 Gators lacked the demeanor it takes to do the things that win close games, but we can draw a few conclusions from the results: (1) It took awhile, perhaps too long, for the real chemistry between Boogie Fland and Xaivian Lee to develop which proved costly in November and December when the Gators started the season 5-4; (2) there was never a go-to guy established for late game situations, evident in all the close call losses; and (3) with the exception of the first Vanderbilt game and the three Kentucky games every Florida win was decided by 10 or more points, which might have hurt when the games got tight.   Lee and Fland had some late game moments when they were superb, but Fland committed crucial turnovers late in the losses to Duke and UConn and his missed defensive assignment in the Iowa loss was critical. Lee had a miserable game shooting the ball against Arizona to start the season and he ended the season against Iowa when he elected to try to pass the ball instead of taking the last shot. The lasting memory of Lee is the Iowa game. It’s easy to say if given a second chance he would have taken the shot or tried to draw a foul, but there are no do-overs.   Urban Klavzar is the only true proven shooter returning for next season (Photo by Chris Spears) Lee has exhausted his eligibility and is headed for the pros. Fland will be back next year as the lead guard. He was a 24 percent 3-point shooter last season and for the Gators to challenge for SEC supremacy and to make a strong NCAA run next year, that has to improve. Urban Klavzar shot 40.6 percent from three but he’s too easy to double up if someone else isn’t a legitimate threat to make an outside shot. The Brown brothers – Isaiah and AJ – are capable shooters so that will help. AJ took a redshirt after his transfer from Ohio U where he shot 38.8 percent from three during the 2024-25 season. In high school, Alex Lloyd was an absolute sniper and CJ Ingram, who could wind up playing the Tommy Haugh role next year, showed late season that he has developed a good looking deep shot. His sample size – 16 threes – is small but he hit eight of them including five of his last seven attempts.   Golden likes a big, fast team that runs the floor. How big the Gators are will be determined by who, if any of the fearsome foursome of Haugh, Alex Condon, Rueben Chinyelu and Micah Handlogten return. It’s entirely possible that all four will be gone and it’s not out of the question that Condon, Chinyelu and Handlogten will be back. If two or more bigs are gone, expect Golden to dip into the portal for at least two in the 6-10 to 7-1 range. If Condon, Chinyelu and Handlogten come back he’ll probably take one from the portal to go with returnee Viktor Mikic and freshman Jones Lay.   But whether it’s a big team that can pound away in the paint or one that is perimeter driven, Golden has to find guys who want to take and can make the last shot.  It is imperative to find one or more closers.   COACHING STUFF Consensus opinion was LSU broke the bank when it fired football coach Brian Kelly and poached Lane Kiffin from Ole Miss. Apparently, LSU has money no one knew about because in hiring Will Wade away from North Carolina State, the boosters are on the hook for $200 million in contract obligations.   Wade was fired with cause by LSU four years ago but after four years of the basketball program spinning its wheels, Matt McMahon was fired and Wade was re-hired. It should be noted that all the things Wade was fired for are now legal. This is why we say NIL stands for now it’s legal.   North Carolina State was quick replacing Wade with Justin Gainey, the top assistant for Rick Barnes at Tennessee.   McMahon was the only SEC coach who was fired but there is an outside possibility that the Vanderbilt job will open if North Carolina can’t land Tommy Lloyd (Arizona), Dusty May (Michigan) or Billy Donovan (Chicago Bulls). Mike Byington is considered the backup plan if UNC whiffs on the three top targets. His Vanderbilt buyout won’t break the UNC bank and he’s familiar with the state since he played collegiately at UNC-Wilmington. Smart money is on Donovan.   Bill Self has announced he will be back at Kansas for 2026-27. Self has had some heart issues in recent years so it was thought he might call it a career.   Keep an eye on Arizona State, which lured Randy Bennett away from Saint Mary’s. Bennett has some health issues of his own, but says he will be back on the job soon. His health issues could influence the transfer decisions of Paulius Murauskas, 7-3 Andrew McKeever and freshman stud Dillan Shaw.   The way too early coaches hot seat for next year starts with Mark Pope at Kentucky. Another season with 10 or more losses or failing to get to the second NCAA weekend will make him a goner. Lamont Paris at South Carolina has a foot out the door already. Steven Pearl and Auburn play in the NIT semifinals tonight. He can buy a lot of good will with the AU faithful if he wins the tournament.   SEC IN THE PORTAL Florida Olivier Rioux (7-9, 305, RFR )   Georgia Jeremiah Wilkinson (6-1, 185, SO); Dylan James (6-9, 235, JR); Somto Cyril (6-11, 260, SO); Jackson McVey (7-1, 240, FR)   Kentucky Jaland Lowe (6-2, 170, JR)   LSU Dedan Thomas Jr. (6-1, 178, JR); Jalen Reed (6-10, 230, SR); Mazi Mosley (6-5, 169, FR); Matt Gilhool (6-11, 213, FR)   Mississippi State Jamarion Davis-Fleming (6-10, 240, FR)   Missouri Anthony Robinson II (6-2, 175, JR); Sebastian Mack (6-3, 195, JR)   Ole Miss Eduardo Klafke (6-5, 190, SO); Ilias Kamardine (6-5, 185, FR); South Carolina Eli Ellis (6-6, 192, FR); Elijah Strong (6-8, 225, JR); EJ Walker (6-7, 253, FR)   Tennessee Tyler Lundblade (6-5, 195, SR, from Belmont)   FINAL FOUR Michigan vs. Arizona: Michigan is tall, deep and plays great defense. Arizona is every bit as tall, plays great defense and has more quality coming off the bench. Michigan can’t win unless it bombs away from three. Arizona can win with or without making a ton of threes. I think Arizona’s Braden Burries and Tobe Awaka coming off the bench as the difference makers. Michigan is favored by 1.5 points but I like Arizona for the win.      Illinois vs. UConn: The Illini have the tallest team in the country and they come at you in waves, but do they have anyone who can handle Tarris Ross, who has gone beast mode for the tournament? UConn has the discipline and head coach Dan Hurley brings championship DNA. The Illini are 1.5-point favorites. I like UConn to win this one.

Sumrall flits about practice like a bee spreading pollen. (Chris Spears Photo)   Jon Sumrall excedes our expectations as a communicator.   There was a time — not so long ago — when covering Florida football felt a little like trying to read smoke signals in a hurricane.   You showed up. You waited. You asked. And mostly, you got… not much.   Billy Napier ran a tight ship, buttoned up at the lips and at the collar, and if there was information to be had, it came out like toothpaste from a nearly empty tube. It would have been quicker waiting for a puff of smoke out of the Vatican.   Access was scarce. And candor? Well, let’s just say it wasn’t exactly flowing down University Avenue.   Then along came Jon Sumrall.   And folks, the man doesn’t just open the door — he knocks the hinges off.   If Napier was guarded, Sumrall is a full-on motormouth. And that’s not a complaint — it’s a joyful revival.   He talks. He jokes. He answers. He leans in. Big media, small media — it doesn’t matter. If you’ve got a question, he’s got a thought, and usually a pretty honest one at that. His philosophy? Simple enough: “Be who I am.”   Turns out, who he is… is refreshing.   There’s no such thing as an off day in this program anymore — not with this coach, not with this wiring. He moves like a man chased by a stopwatch, fueled by equal parts purpose and paranoia, convinced there’s always one more call to make, one more hand to shake, one more edge to find.   They’ve started to notice: The lights are on earlier, the texts come later and the pace never quite slows to a walk.   He’s a connector by nature, a relentless dot-linker, working the state — and beyond — like a bee in full bloom season, pollinating every corner of his football colony. High school coaches, boosters, parents, former players, seventh graders with a Hudl page — nobody’s too small, nobody’s off the grid. Because in his mind, every conversation is a seed and every seed has a chance to grow into something Florida can use on Saturdays.   No days off? That’s not a slogan. That’s just how he’s built.   Spend five minutes around Sumrall and you’ll hear everything from roster evaluations to life lessons pulled from the most unlikely places. Urban Meyer. Ron Zook. Liam Coen. Even his son’s middle school practice.   “I want to learn something from everybody,” he says. Imagine that — a coach at Florida still curious.   On the field, the reviews from spring camp are about what you’d expect this time of year: Flashes of promise, mixed with the occasional head-scratcher.   “Every day,” Sumrall admits, “I’ve seen some plays where I’m like, ‘That’s it.’ And then every day, I’ve seen some plays where I’m like, ‘That ain’t it.’ ”   Translation? There’s work to do.   But there’s also something else —something this program has been starving for.   Juice. Energy. A sense that somebody’s actually pushing the gas pedal.   “They were playing like their hair was on fire,” said former Gator Caleb Banks after watching practice. That’s not coach-speak. That’s a player recognizing a pulse. Sumrall has already started identifying his tone-setters.   Cornerback Ben Hanks III is earning praise as the most consistent in the secondary. Georgia Tech transfer tight end Luke Harpring is the “best all-around” at his spot so far.   And up front, Brendan Bett and Penn State transfer TJ Shanahan are the kind of linemen, Sumrall says, who “crack the egg”—the kind you don’t have to wonder about when it comes to physicality.   And then there’s Myles Graham, fresh off shoulder surgery, not even fully live yet — but already flashing instincts that make coaches smile and quarterbacks uneasy.   “He just wants to pop pads,” Sumrall grinned. “That’s who he is.”   That might be the most telling line of the spring.   Because this Florida team, for all its talent, hasn’t always played like it wanted to hit somebody.   Ditto the recuperating WR blazer Dallas Wilson, who can spook the DBs as he’s starting to run a little.   Sumrall noticed. But he’s not particularly interested in making friends or being liked while fixing it.   Take tailback Jadan Baugh — a gifted, willing player by all accounts. Sumrall isn’t handing out back slaps.   “I don’t care if he likes me,” he said. “I hope he respects me.”   That’s not cold. That’s clarity.   And maybe that’s the biggest difference so far — not just the volume of Sumrall’s voice, but the sharpness of his message.   He’ll joke about being a “great coach when I’ve got great players,” even tossing a wink toward NIL efforts.   He’ll rib Ron Zook about aging. But underneath it all is a guy who knows exactly what he’s looking for — and isn’t afraid to say when he’s not seeing it.   “I’m not patient,” Sumrall often admits. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t need to have some patience.”   In other words, he’s human. And he’s honest about it. Which, around here, feels like a bit of a breakthrough.   It’s only spring. Nobody’s hanging banners. Nobody’s booking Atlanta. And there are still plenty of “that ain’t it” moments to clean up.   But for the first time in a while, Florida football sounds different.   More open. More urgent. More alive.   And if nothing else, at least now when you ask a question… you might actually get an answer.   I would like to add “amen“ and “thank you” on behalf of the working media who covers University of Florida football.

Will Rueben Chinyelu return to Florida or bolt for the NBA (Photo by Chris Spears) When Rueben Chinyelu was announced as the National Defensive Player of the Year Tuesday by the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC), it confirmed what Todd Golden has been saying for months. With the 2026 award in hand, is it possible that Chinyelu will be back in his Florida uniform with a chance to not only win the defensive player of the year award a second time, but get the Gators back in the Final Four?   Golden along with the entire Gator Nation is waiting decisions from Chinyelu, Alex Condon and Micah Handlogten. Will Chinyelu and Condon declare for the NBA Draft and will Handlogten get the NCAA waiver that will allow him another year of eligibility?   Condon is projected a second rounder in nearly every mock NBA draft, but he’s close enough to late first round that the NBA Combine and individual workouts could slide him in among the top 30 selections. In Florida’s last 15 games, Condon averaged 17.2 points and 6.3 rebounds. He finished second on the team with 3.6 assists per game and averaged 1.4 blocked shots. He’s not a 3-point shooter but his development of a deadly floater from 10 feet on in is a real plus.   Chinyelu is projected middle of the second round at the earliest. He finished fourth in the country in rebounding (11.2) while scoring 10.9 points per game. He’s an exceptional defender who is mobile enough to take on guards on the perimeter while being an imposing presence in the paint. His offensive game is raw, confined to baby hooks inside five feet and dunks. His lack of a jump shot even out to 10-12 feet hurts his draft stock since the NBA has so many bigs who can shoot from the foul line on out to three.   All first rounders get multi-year, guaranteed money contracts. It’s rare that a second rounder gets multiple years and guaranteed money although it has been done. Chandler Parsons got a four-year guaranteed deal worth $3.7 million with the Houston Rockets back in 2011, but that’s a rarity. Kennedy Chandler in 2022 got a 4-year deal worth $7.1 million as a second rounder, all the money guaranteed, but he was waived in 2023. Since the money was guaranteed he was paid through last season.   Second round picks get contracts that are guaranteed, partially-guaranteed and 2-way deals. Most second rounders get the NBA minimum (somewhere around $1.2 million) if they stick with the team. Many second rounders are signed to 2-way deals which means 50 percent of the NBA minimum plus NBA per game for every game they play when called up to the big club.   Thanks to NIL money, both Condon and Chinyelu could make more money coming back to Florida if their agents aren’t assured of a multi-year contract for the second round.   Handlogten’s fate is in the hands of the NCAA but considering many of the recent rulings and court cases, there is a good chance he returns.   Here is the Florida roster breakdown:   GONERS Xaivian Lee (6-4, 185, SR): Does he go with the G-League or leave for Europe? His game translates nicely to the Euro style.   Olivier Rioux (7-9, 305, RFR): He’s in the portal, hoping to land somewhere that he can play.   AWAITING DECISIONS Tommy Haugh (6-9, 215, JR): He’s moved up in many mock drafts to lottery level. Figure he will go somewhere between 12 and 16, which means four years and somewhere in the $20-27-million range. Could he come back? Anything is possible. Will he come back? Don’t bet even $1 dollar on it.   Alex Condon dunks on Kentucky (Photo by Chris Spears) Alex Condon (6-11, 236, JR:): ESPN’s latest two-round mock draft has Condon going No. 33 to Memphis. NBAdraft.net has him slipping into the first round at No. 29 to San Antonio. Nail biter of a decision to be made here.   Rueben Chinyelu (6-11, 265, JR): Nearly every mock draft has Chinyelu somewhere in the 40s of the second round. ESPN’s mock has him No. 47 to the Magic. Seems wise for him to return. He will definitely make more money at UF.   Micah Handlogten (7-1, 260, SR): He has appealed to the NCAA for an extra season. There is no telling what the NCAA will rule, but considering some of the decisions that have been made, plus the chance that Micah can take his appeal to the courts, there is a very good chance he will get the waiver to return.   Viktor Mikic (6-11, 260, SO): He’s only been seen in mop up minutes in real games, but he practices hard and has a strong work ethic. He can shoot the ball from the 3-point line with a very nice stroke. Played last summer for Serbia’s 19-and-under team at the FIBA Euros.   Alex Kovatchev (6-5, 195, RSO): Australian who played sparingly after transferring in from Sacramento State. Very good practice player and good defensively.   CJ Ingram (6-7, 210, FR): He knows he will have first shot at Tommy Haugh’s job, so why would he leave? He has all the athletic ability in the world, he’s developed a very nice 3-point shot and he’s a legacy of one of the more popular Gators of all time (Cornelius Ingram). He has grown since the start of the 2025-26 season and it wouldn’t be surprising if he tops out somewhere between 6-8 and 6-9.   COMMITTED TO RETURN Boogie Fland is set to return for another season (Photo by Chris Spears) Boogie Fland (6-3, 185, SO): He can handle the ball, play great defense and get the ball up the court in a hurry. Has to become a consistent 3-point shooter and eliminate turnovers.   Urban Klavzar (6-1, 190, JR): SEC Sixth Man of the Year. Should thrive in a starting role. True 3-point bomber who hit 40.6 percent of his threes. Could he be on the Slovenia roster for the FIBA Euro World Cup tournament this summer?   AJ Brown (6-5, 210, RJR): Excellent 3-point shooter who, after transferring from Ohio U, took a redshirt to rehab his surgically repaired shoulder. Very physical defender.   Isaiah Brown (6-5, 210, JR): Played himself into the rotation with his defense and energy. His 3-point shooting was a plus. He has star quality.   Alex Lloyd (6-3, 180, FR): Seems more of a combo guard than a pure point. Excellent shooter from deep. Needs to add 10-20 pounds of muscle to handle the rigors of the SEC.     INTERESTING NAMES IN THE TRANSFER PORTAL Paulius Mauraskas (6-8, 235, JR, Saint Mary’s): Yes, he’s a one-and-done but if he’s interested in UF then take him. He’s powerful, can handle the ball and he can shoot. The thought is he will follow Randy Bennett to Arizona State but if he’s available, take him. Lithuanian from the Zalgris organization.   Andrew McKeever (7-3, 285, SO, Saint Mary’s): You can’t teach tall (7-3) and he’s got aircraft carrier size. At Saint Mary’s he did what he was asked to do, stick back misses in the paint, rebound and scare people from venturing into the paint. Averaged 8.2 points and 9.2 rebounds. Will he follow Randy Bennett to Arizona State?   Christian Hammond (6-4, 195, SO, Santa Clara): There is a lot of talk that Florida is already in the mix. As a sophomore he averaged 15.6 points, 3.0 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game for an NCAA team. Outstanding defender who shot 39.3 percent from the 3-point line.   Joel Foxwell (6-1, 180, FR, Portland): Australian transplant who is exceptional in the open court. Great ball handler and passer who averaged 15.6 points, 4.3 rebounds and 6.5 assists per game, which ranked 13 th nationally. Needs work on his shot, but is an outstanding distributor. Averaged 1.5 steals per game and 80.7 percent from the foul line.   Ben Defty (7-0, 255, SO, Boston University): German native who played high school basketball at a New England prep school. Defty was one of the most improved players in the country as a sophomore. Legitimate size, serious rim protector. Averaged 15.1 points, 6.8 rebounds and 1.7 blocked shots per game.   Adam Olsen (6-8, 225, JR, South Alabama): Serious shooter who hit 39.1 percent from three. Spent two years playing in Canada before arriving in the US at South Alabama. Would the NCAA give him one or two years eligibility? Averaged 16.7 points and 4.1 rebounds. Does he rebound well enough?   Sam Orme (6-9, 220, SO, Belmont): First and foremost, Florida’s last transfer from Belmont (Will Richard) turned out pretty well, didn’t he? Averaged 12.7 points, 5.0 rebounds and shot 39.7 percent on 3-pointers as a sophomore. Career average 11.2 points and 38.7 percent on threes.   Neoklis Avdalas (6-9, 215, FR, Virginia Tech): He can play all three wing positions quite well, but is most comfortable at the point. As a freshman, he averaged 12.1 points, 3.1 rebounds and 4.6 assists per game. He’s 20 years old and from Greece.   Sananda Fru (6-11, 245, JR, Louisville): If circumstances require a one-and-done big, then this might be a good choice for the Gators. Played two years in the Euro leagues then spent last year at Louisville where he averaged 9.0 points and 6.1 rebounds per game. Very physical.   Brandon Benjamin (6-8, 240, FR, Fairfield): Rebounding machine who averaged 14.2 points and 10.4 rebounds per game as the only big on a vertically challenged team. Three years eligibility.   Baye Ndongo (6-9, 250, JR, Georgia Tech): Native of Senegal who has scored 1,133 points (12.6 per game) and grabbed 762 rebounds (8.5 per game) as a 3-year starter for a bad team. A possibility if the Gators are looking for a one-and-done type who allows young players to develop.   Brant Byers (6-8, 200, SO, Miami OH): He will be one of the most sought after players in the portal. He’s a 6-8 wing guard who can shoot (39.1 percent from three), rebound and handle the ball. Averaged 14.2 points and 4.1 rebounds for Miami. Was one of the best late game clutch shooters in the country.   SEC TRANSFERS Florida Olivier Rioux (7-9, 305, RFR): He’s still got a long way to go and he’s nowhere near ready for play in the Southeastern Conference. He needs to go somewhere that he’ll have a chance to earn meaningful minutes so he can develop.   Georgia Jeremiah Wilkinson (6-1, 185, SO): Huge loss for Mike White. Big time scorer (17.4 last season) who averaged 15.1 as a freshman at California. Atlanta native. Will be a priority recruit for Tennessee, Alabama and Auburn.   Dylan James (6-9, 235, JR): Big and strong but an average rebounder and not much on the offensive end. Winter Haven native who could wind up at South Florida or UCF.   Somto Cyril (6-11, 260, SO): Huge loss for Georgia. One of the nation’s top rim protectors who averaged 9.4 points, 5.4 rebounds and 2.2 blocks per game. Nigerian who played high school basketball at Hamilton Heights in Chattanooga, same school that several Gators including Mikic have come from. Expect Florida to be involved.   Kentucky Jaland Lowe (6-2, 170, JR): Transferred to UK from Pitt but played in only eight games due to injury. Probably will get another year because of the injury. In the eight games he played averaged 8.0 points, 2.1 rebounds and 2.4 assists. Not a very good shooter,   LSU Dedan Thomas Jr. (6-1, 178, JR): Instant offense. He can score and he was leading the SEC in assists before he got hurt. Averaged 15.3 points and 6.5 assists. Spent his first two seasons at UNLV and was once a high priority Florida recruit. Played in 16 games this past season and will likely appeal for another year.   Jalen Reed (6-10, 230, SR): He’s only played in 14 games the last two years because of injuries, so he’s almost guaranteed to get at least one year more of eligibility. Was a priority recruit for UF in the Mike White days.     Mazi Mosley (6-5, 169, FR): He was a 4-star recruit out of high school but averaged only 6.3 minutes in 19 games as a freshman.   Mississippi State Jamarion Davis-Fleming (6-10, 240, FR): He’s got size and potential. Shouldn’t last long on the portal with three years eligibility remaining. Averaged 3.7 points and 4.9 rebounds in 20 minutes per game.   Missouri Anthony Robinson II (6-2, 175, JR): He’s a Tallahassee native who probably winds up playing his last year at FSU. Averaged 8.9 points, 3.1 rebounds and 3.0 assists at Mizzou last season.   Ole Miss Eduardo Klafke (6-5, 190, SO): Brazilian with shooting skills but not much in the way of defense. Averaged 4.6 points and 2.5 rebounds per game off the bench.   Ilias Kamardine (6-5, 185, FR): This is a big loss for the Rebels. A former pro in France, Kamardine averaged 11.3 points, 3.4 rebounds and 3.8 assists as a freshman. Have to figure he’s one-and-done wherever he goes since he’s already 22 years old.   South Carolina Eli Ellis (6-6, 192, FR): Averaged 8.9 points. Arrived at SC with a reputation as a shooter but hit only 28 percent of his threes.   Elijah Strong (6-8, 225, JR): Third year guy who spent his first two seasons at Boston College. Averaged 10 points and 2.3 rebounds.   EJ Walker (6-7, 253, FR): Physically very strong but lacks height to play inside in the SEC. Averaged 2.9 points and 2.7 rebounds.

Hoping to get back on track vs Stetson (UAA Photo) They fell one pitch shy with two out against Arkansas By EDDIE GILLEY GatorBaitMedia.com The Gators softball team was team was hoping to bounce back Wednesday night at Stetson after a tough weekend when it was just one pitch away from leaving Arkansas with a series win.  With two outs and two on in the bottom of the seventh inning, Gator Ace Keagan Rothrock delivered the pitch to Dakota Kennedy who got just enough of the pitch to send it over the left field fence for a walk-off three run home run to defeat the Gators 6-4. It was the second three run homer of the day given up by Rothrock. The Gators once led 4-0 before the Razorbacks came back to take the series 2 games to 1. The Gators won game two 12-6 on Saturday. They scored 7 runs in innings 2-5 after trailing 1-0 in the first. Arkansas responded with 5 runs in the 5th and 6th innings to take the game to the 7th inning trailing by one. The Gators put up 5 runs in the top of the 7th to seal the victory. Katelynn Oxley picked up the win to move to 3-0 on the season. Rothrock recorded her 3 save coming in to close the door in the 6th and 7th innings. Ella Wesolowski, Kenleigh Cahalan, Kendall Grover and Cassidy McLellan all hit home runs for the Gators. The Gator bats also contributed 6 doubles on the night.   Thy lost the Friday night game 6-2. Rothrock took the loss and with the loss on Sunday, she now stands at 17-4 on the season. The Gator offense was held to a season-low 3 hits on the night.   They had a chance to win the series despite a rare series of struggling at the plate by Taylor Shumaker who went 1-8 on the weekend. Jocelyn Erickson hit .300 which is great by many standards but far below her average coming into the weekend. Other than the cold bats on the cold Friday night, the rest of the team picked up their leaders at the dish with enough runs and hits to potentially win the series.  However, a bloop single with one out in the seventh by Arkansas career hit leader, Raegan Johnson, a walk to Brinli Bain, a strike out of Ella McDowell, and the fateful blow by Kennedy spoiled their effort. The wind was definitely a factor on Sunday, blowing out both the dramatic walk-off homer and the two-run homer by Kenleigh Cahalan of the Gators in the 1st inning to center field.  Usually if you can get one win on the road in the SEC and win every series at home you have a good chance of winning the SEC Softball crown. If you can win the road series and sweep at home those are bonuses. So far the Gator program has been able to reach those goals. Time will tell if this tough loss will come back to bite the Gators chance of winning the championship. The Gators, who defeated the Hatters, 3-2, on March 25 in Gainesville, are looking for their 14th straight win over Stetson going back to the 2006 season. First pitch was set for 6 p.m. on ESPN+ from the Stetson Softball Complex.

Straight ahead to stardom. Jadan Baugh knows the way. (Chris Spears photo)   Is Jadan Baugh About To Become A Superstar?   Jaden Baugh might be the worst-kept secret in Gainesville — which, in a town that leaks football opinions like a screen door on a submarine, is saying something.   The real question isn’t whether Florida has a running back. It’s whether Buster Faulkner has been quietly sitting on a Sunday thoroughbred while everyone else was arguing about the paint job on the wagon.   Is Jaden Baugh a superstar in the making?   Well, let’s not go pinning a gold jacket on the kid just yet. This is still college football, where one good year gets you a podcast and two gets you a parking spot. But if you’ve been paying attention — and not everybody has — there’s something brewing here that doesn’t feel like your standard-issue 1,000-yard back.   It feels different. Baugh didn’t arrive with trumpets. He showed up in 2024 as a true freshman and looked like he’d taken a wrong turn out of an NFL weight room. Then in 2025, he stopped asking permission and ran for 1,170 yards, eight touchdowns, and another ten total scores, averaging 5.3 a carry while dragging SEC defenders around like loose luggage.   First 1,000-yard rusher at Florida in a decade.   That alone ought to get your attention — or at least wake up the folks who’ve been sleepwalking through the Gators’ run game since the Muschamp era.   But the number that really matters isn’t the yardage. It’s the 81 forced missed tackles, eighth in the nation. That’s not blocking. That’s not scheme. That’s a running back making business decisions for defenders who suddenly remember they left the stove on.   At 6-foot-1, 231 pounds, Baugh looks like he should run through people — and he does — but what’s been underestimated is how often he runs away from them.   There’s a slipperiness there, a little daylight magic that doesn’t show up on the roster sheet. At practice Tuesday, the head coach took note: “He's a hard tackle, man ... he's been fun to watch," Sumrall said. And also noted he bounced off a tackle and made a spin move that caught his eye.   And here’s the part that should make defensive coordinators reach for antacids: Baugh caught 33 passes, and probably could’ve caught 50 if anyone had bothered to make it a priority.   Now comes 2026, and the training wheels are off.   Jon Sumrall walks in with a new staff, a reshuffled backfield, and a pretty obvious centerpiece whether he wants one or not. Baugh isn’t sharing the spotlight anymore — he is the spotlight. A $1 million NIL deal says as much, and so does the fact that he told Texas “thanks, but no thanks” when the portal came calling.   That’s not just loyalty. That’s a player who knows exactly what he is.   CBS is already labeling him a breakout star, tossing around phrases like “top five running back in the nation.” NFL scouts, never ones for subtlety, are calling him a “2027 RB1 hiding in plain sight.”   Which, translated into plain English, means: “How did we miss this guy?”   Truth is, a lot of people did.   I didn’t.   First time I saw him — spring game, early enrollee, barely had a name stitched on the back of the jersey — I remember thinking, Who in the world is that? Big, fast, strong, and moving like he had somewhere else to be. You don’t need a stat sheet to recognize that combination. You just need eyes.   Back then, nobody was talking about him. Now they are. And maybe they should’ve been all along.   Give Billy Napier his due — he and his brother Matt helped spot Baugh early, and Jabbar Juluke closed the deal, flipping him from Arkansas and fending off Alabama like it was just another Tuesday. Recruiting gets graded in hindsight, and this one is starting to look like a blue-chip theft.   Even the new running backs coach, Chris Foster, got a firsthand taste of the drama — a Christmas Eve visit just to figure out who exactly he was inheriting, walking into a recruitment that still had one foot in the transfer portal and the other in Gainesville. He came away talking about Baugh’s football IQ and composure, which is coach-speak for “this kid isn’t guessing.”   And that matters. Because here’s the part people tend to forget when they start drawing up highlight reels: You can’t run the ball if the defense doesn’t respect it. And you can’t throw it if you can’t run it.   Florida may very well lean into a more pass-oriented system under Sumrall, but that’s fine — as long as Baugh is the reason defenses can’t cheat. The trick isn’t choosing between run and pass. The trick is making the other guy wrong, no matter what you call. That’s where Baugh lives.   So is he a superstar? Too early to say. But he’s not a secret anymore. And if the Gators finally build an offense that understands what it has — really understands it — then the rest of the country is about to find out what Gainesville already should know.   Sometimes the best player on the field isn’t the one they hyped. It’s the one they overlooked.   And those are the ones who usually make you pay for it.

Who will get picked? There's plenty of QB Competition. Philo takes a rep in Spring Ball. (UAA Photo)   It’s not who starts the season at quarterback, but who winds up there. There was something just a little different in the air over The Swamp Saturday morning — and no, it wasn’t just the familiar humidity settling back into its spring home. It was new. It was uncertain. And it was loud.   For the first time, Jon Sumrall walked his Florida Gators onto that historic field not as a visitor, not as a visiting team coordinator passing through, but as the man in charge. And if first impressions matter — and in this business they always do — then Sumrall’s first Swamp practice had a little edge to it.   You could feel it most at quarterback.   Because make no mistake, this is not a ceremonial spring. This is a job interview. And front and center stood Aaron Philo and Tramell Jones, two quarterbacks separated by style, background, and experience — but united by one undeniable truth: neither has been handed anything.   Not by Sumrall. Not by Buster Faulkner. Not by circumstance. Especially not by Faulkner. If there’s a gravitational force inside this quarterback room, it’s the offensive coordinator — a high-octane, sleeves-rolled-up, “let’s go right now” kind of football coach who doesn’t do idle.   And Philo knows him better than anyone because they served together at Georgia Tech.   “He was the first one to really believe in me,” Philo said, and there was no hesitation in it. No coach-speak. No polish. Just truth.   That belief goes back to Tech, where Faulkner saw something in Philo before the recruiting world fully caught on.   That matters. In a sport built on projection and promises, belief is currency.   It’s also why Philo followed him.   Not for guarantees — because there weren’t any.   Not for comfort — because this is anything but.   Philo made that clear. Faulkner didn’t bring him to Gainesville to anoint him. He brought him to compete.   And compete he is. Philo looks like a quarterback who understands the system because he does. The ball comes out on time. The reads are clean. There’s a rhythm to his game that matches Faulkner’s “multi-faceted” design — an offense that wants to stress you horizontally, vertically, and mentally all at once.   But then there’s Jones. And Jones doesn’t care what system you run — he’s going to test its limits anyway.   Where Philo is timing and trust, Jones is instinct and electricity. You can see it when plays break down, when structure dissolves and football becomes backyard again. That’s where Jones lives.   And that’s what makes this fascinating.   Because Faulkner’s offense needs both discipline and dynamism. It needs a quarterback who can deliver the ball to playmakers — something Philo pointed out as a hallmark of Faulkner’s system — but it also benefits from a player who can create when the playbook runs out of answers.   Saturday, there were moments for each.   A crisp intermediate throw from Philo that drew a nod from Faulkner — not a smile, mind you, because smiles are earned slowly around here.   Then a scramble-and-strike from Jones that made a handful of teammates let out that involuntary “whoa” that coaches pretend not to hear but absolutely do.   Sumrall watched it all with the practiced calm of a coach who knows this decision won’t be made in March.   But it’s started.   You’ll get varying reports from those who were there, but one insider who was there that I follow and trust on TwitterX said: “Quarterbacks looked good today, Philo with a slight edge.”   Sounds like the weather forecast “sunny, with partly cloudy skies.” But we get it. It’s going to take a minute.   Sumrall loves the competition and has been quick to remind us that the door is still open for others. He especially likes freshman Will Griffin, saying that as soon as he has all the tools in his tool kit, he’s going to be contending for reps.   And there are others in what amounts to a five -man depth chart — a nice problem to have!   And here’s the part worth remembering: This competition isn’t about who Faulkner likes more. If anything, Philo’s history with him makes this harder, not easier.   Because belief got him here. But performance will keep him here.   Faulkner is still that “fired-up guy” Philo described — pacing, correcting, demanding. The same coach who saw something early is now asking for more, louder, faster, better.   That’s the deal.   That’s always the deal.   So as the echoes bounced off the empty seats of The Swamp — seats that will be anything but empty come fall — the Gators come into this season with 18 straight sellouts — you could almost hear the question forming.   Not who starts. But who wins it.   And on this first day, in this first chapter of the Sumrall era, the only honest answer is this: Nobody yet. Which, in a place like Florida, makes it just about perfect.