NEW YORK – In the past 35 years, only two reigning national champions have started a season by losing four of their first nine games.
This year’s Florida Gators are one of two.
The other was 2014-15 UConn, which finished 20-15 and missed the NCAA Tournament under then-coach Kevin Ollie.
However, that won’t be the fate for No. 18 Florida. A team that started the season ranked No. 3, including eight first-place ballots from AP voters, is disappointing in record but still promising in predictive metrics. Right now, the Gators are still searching for themselves and looking for answers, knowing that good results are within reach. On Tuesday night, it looked like Todd Golden’s team had finally gotten some clarity, only to see their final high-profile game end in exciting but disappointing style at the Jimmy V Classic, a 77-73 loss to No. 5 UConn.
Florida might have been able to take the game to overtime if Boogie Fland could have gotten the ball in with 9.3 seconds left, Florida trailing by three. Instead, Fland turned the ball over after a five-second call – also a quick whistle. Golden said the same thing during his postgame presser.
“I thought they called about it early, man, to be honest with you,” he said. “I challenge anyone to time it and see what they come up with. We timed it in the locker room and we got 4.6 and 4.7. At a moment like that – I’ve been involved in the game for a long time, to get a call like that where it’s not even five seconds – they usually give you an extra second, to be honest. Just a very, very tough pill to swallow.”
However, Golden did not use the call as an excuse for the loss. In fact, Golden told CBS Sports that the series highlights the biggest difference between this season’s team and the team that won the NCAA championship in April.
“It’s very simple: our margin for error is not what it was last year,” Golden said.
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A season ago, Florida went 12-2 against ranked competition. They are 0-3 this season, albeit with losses to Arizona (in Las Vegas to start the season), Duke (on the road) and UConn (at MSG/Storrs South). Those are three of the six best teams in the sport. These losses totaled 11 points, with each game coming down to the last two possessions.
That’s why every regular predictive metric has UF ranked 16th or better as of Wednesday morning. You can lose games and still be considered a pretty good team, provided the teams you lose to are actually good. And that’s where Golden’s team finds itself a quarter of the way through the season.
The biggest problem Golden faces is one any coach would accept: winning a national championship on the strength of the best three-guard starting lineup in school history, only to struggle to replace that group just months later.
Walter Clayton Jr., Will Richard and Alijah Martin are forever legends in Gainesville. In their place, Boogie Fland transfers from Arkansas, and former Princeton point guard Xaivian Lee is undeniably feeling the pressure to meet a high standard.
“I think we’re all feeling a little bit of pressure to play this really tough schedule, coming in with real expectations, whereas last year I don’t think anyone really believed in our team until after the new year,” Golden told me. “We lost a really good backcourt. It’s going to take some time for this team to feel comfortable again. Unlike last year, we didn’t have a scheme where we could beat teams and gain confidence that way. So we have to build that a little differently.”
By the way, Florida’s non-con program ranks third in the nation. The fourth loss was against TCU in San Diego, an extended lead that ended at 84-80. That’s the only thing that bothers Golden.
“It’s about being a mentally tough guy and being able to be mature and professional in the way we evaluate ourselves,” Golden said. “It’s pretty clear that we haven’t played our best yet. We haven’t had a night where everyone was really rolling. And that being said, we’ve been right in every one of these games.”
At 9-1, UConn could prove to be as good as any team in the country this season. The Huskies have yet to play a game where everyone on the roster was truly at full strength. Tuesday night, Florida trailed by 10 in the second half and pushed back to take the lead. At one point it went to a 17-7 run. The two most recent national champions have given us a game worthy of the hype.
“This isn’t a lack of talent problem or something that makes me hopeless,” Golden said. “A big part of that is taking advantage of second-chance opportunities. We can’t have 16 offensive rebounds and only turn that into six or seven points.”
Lee (and Fland, to a lesser extent) have been the main target of criticism over the past five weeks, but if Lee doesn’t play on Tuesday night, Florida will lose by double digits. He had a team-best 19 points, along with six rebounds, five assists and two steals. The problematic pattern didn’t stop, though: Lee’s three-point shooting was a problem here, as it is in every game. He’s just 20.3% from deep this season and was 1-of-7 from beyond the arc against UConn. If Lee had hit one or two more treys, maybe the game would change for Florida.
Golden told me that the lack of reliable perimeter shooting limits Florida’s ability to make the top teams this season. That is supported by the fact that Thomas Haugh (18 points) was again great. Fellow forward Alex Condon (14 points) had a good night, as did Rueben Chinyelu, who grabbed 11 boards. The bigs are building themselves into one of the best frontcourts the sport has to offer.
“We’re close, but we’re not there yet against the top four or five teams in America,” Golden said. “It’s not like we’re running out of the gym during these games. We’re right there.”
An interesting matchup is scheduled for next Saturday in Sunrise, Florida, against 8-2 George Washington, but Florida should see an influx of wins over the next three weeks. With the SEC well down from last season’s record campaign, the toughest part of this team’s schedule appears to be over. The Gators were overrated in October, but this should still be one of the SEC’s best teams at the end of January.
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