University of Florida Athletics issued the following announcement on Nov. 1.
It's going to be different. Very different.
For the crowd that files Monday night into Exactech Arena/O'Connell Center, the players suiting up for the Florida basketball team … ... ...
Wait. Full stop.
Was that a reference to an actual crowd at a UF college basketball game? With no space restrictions, social distancing or masks? Yeah, that's different.
OK, now back to that team thing, which is going to be wayyyyyy different.
When public address announcer Tom Collette introduces the starting lineup before Florida faces Division II Embry-Riddle in Monday night's exhibition, he'll pretty much be introducing the Gators in a literal sense. A bunch of these guys are strangers, with three of the five starting spots expected to be occupied by three of the four transfer players who joined the program during the offseason. The fourth of that transfer quartet will get significant playing time as well, as UF raises the curtain on a team that includes seven newcomers — them most under Coach Mike White, now in his seventh season — alongside five returnees who helped the team go 15-10 and advanced to a fourth straight NCAA Tournament.
Look for the starting five to include three fifth-year seniors, plus two true seniors, with another fifth-year senior first off the bench. Of those first half-dozen in the rotation, four will be 23 years old. Some NBA teams can't make that claim.
"We have a unique team," said one of those Year-5 guys and returning starters, forward Anthony Duruji, who took the maturation theme to another level when he got married over the summer. "This is the oldest group I've ever been a part of. It's a lot of good guys who I would say are humble. We have the pieces and we want to max out."
Whether they're the right pieces, of course, is something that will play itself out as the games come (the 2021-22 opener is Nov. 9 against Elon) and roles are defined.
"Our chemistry is great right now, but that's usually how it is before we start playing against other teams and the coach starts to say who's starting and 'this is how much I want you to play, these are the scorers, these are the rebounders and this is what I want you to do.' That's really when the chemistry starts to shake," said fifth-year senior guard Phlandrous Fleming Jr., who scored 1,510 points and was two-time Big South Conference Defensive Player of the Year over his four seasons at Charleston Southern. "If we can stay on pace with our chemistry we'll be good. I think that also goes into us being an older team."
Original source can be found here.
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