GAINESVILLE, Fla. – As the Gators have propelled themselves into tournament position in recent weeks with a season best five-game winning streak different guys have stepped their game up in order for Florida to find different ways to win.
“Everybody’s always ready and able to contribute,” Gators center Kevarrius Hayes said Friday.
Hayes was a big part of Florida’s win at Vanderbilt Wednesday with 14 points on a perfect 5-5 shooting for the first win for the Gators at Memorial Gym since 2014. Jalen Hudson also dropped a season-high 17 points as well.
“I feel like everybody has their own unique qualities, like different ways that they score, different ways they affect the game,” Hayes said. “And then, there comes a night where we might rely on a certain group of people.
“Energy has to always be there, but some nights offensively it’s not going to be your night. I like that everybody is not selfish. Nobody makes it their night every night. We share the ball well. Like, against Vandy, it was me and J-Hud primarily scoring inside out. Tomorrow against Georgia, it might be a different set of guys.”
The variety of scoring has certainly been a positive as of late.
The Gators probably wouldn’t be on such a hot streak without Hayes, Andrew Nembhard and Jalen Hudson stepping up on the offensive side to go along with KeVaughn Allen, Noah Locke and Keyontae Johnson.
However, from a coach’s perspective it can be a bit of a double-edge sword.
“Well it’s nice,” Head coach Mike White said. “It’s refreshing, but at the same time it’s head scratching because you wonder why we couldn’t figure this out against this team or against this that team or why the other night we had some really good performances by two or three guys, maybe four guys and then we had a couple guys that we couldn’t get into a rhythm.
“So you’re always even after wins sometimes it’s easier to get more buy-in in this regard after a win to figure out why can’t we get this or that? Why can’t we get eight of us playing at a high level offensively at the same time? That’s what we’re shooting for.”
Florida has grown into a much more well rounded team as the offense has improved, and over the last few weeks they have moved up 40 spots in offensive efficiency.
One of the biggest reasons why the Gators have been able to make such a drastic change is their change in mentality toward the game and unselfish play.
“I thought early on we had some selfishness issues, had some agenda stuff going on offensively and weren’t nearly good enough to overcome those things,” White admitted. Is it perfect now? No.
“I thought we took a couple my turn shots in Nashville, but it’s gotten a lot better. I would say led by Nembhard as much as anybody. He goes out he can lead us in scoring, he can take one shot, he can take eight shots, he can take three shots.
“He has made the biggest jump in terms of just playing the game and letting the game and allowing the defense to dictate how he attacks. And I think generally speaking the rest of the roster done a better job of that as well.
“We’ve definitely settled in a lot more. Not great but much better.”
