GAINESVILLE, Fla.-- Florida basketball (16-9, 8-4) is on a nice run. The Gators have won four of their last five SEC games and are still heavily in contention in the conference.
The better news? The Gators are playing as a more cohesive offense - an offense where players are not scared to take an extra pass to find a better shot.
“Better passing team? I would hope so, that we’re evolving that way,” Mike White told reporters on Monday. “We’ve been trending that way over the past two or three weeks. Some of it is skill level stuff, you know, that’s a factor, especially freshmen and sophomores just getting better at simply passing. We do a lot of passing drills in practice.”
“I feel like we are moving the ball to go along with the Florida offense,” Keyontae Johnson said. “We are trying to get everybody the ball. We move it all around a lot. We score off of it. We see it at practice and we try to carry it over in the game.”
The Gators head coach says the coaches needed to adjust midway through the season.
“We found out, probably about three months ago, that we really struggled in that category. I definitely would not put us in the ‘good’ category in terms of team passing, but hopefully trending upward," explained White. "I think we’ve got two high-level passers in (Andrew) Nembhard and (Kerry) Blackshear, and the rest of us are improving.”
Although the phrase, 'this team is young,' has been used a number of times, it does hold truth. It appears, however, that this team is maturing at the right time - when it comes to the offense at least.
“I think it’s understanding that they’ve got to play the game and not force and take ‘my turn’ shots and lately we haven’t been doing that,” Nembhard said.
The Gators will hope to continue on this trajectory with Arkansas (16-9, 4-8) in town Tuesday.
This is the Razorbacks's first season under Erick Musselman, who arrived at Arkansas after a very successful four-year tenure at Nevada. The Gators are very familiar with Musselman, after meeting him in the NCAA Tournament last season.
"He had a big-time run there of course, and we were really fortunate to hold those guys off in the NCAA Tournament, it was a great college basketball game," said White. "And he’s doing some similar stuff, but you know, on game day tomorrow, when you’ve just got a bunch of time, we might go back and watch some of that again just for the heck of it, but we’ve been really focused on our current team and his current team and, you know, it’s a completely different deal for him and for us. We’re a completely different team.”
Arkansas will rely on Mason Jones on Tuesday.
In Arkansas' heartbreaking defeat against Mississippi State, Jones netted 38 points. He is the SEC's scoring leader at 43.3% from the floor, 33 percent from the outside and 82.7 from the charity stripes. He leads the team with 20.8 points and 6.0 rebounds a game.
"He’s a different player than he was a year ago," said White. "He’s even a different player since Isaiah Joe went out with his aggressiveness and the level at which they’re playing through him. I don’t know how you guard the guy. The way that he shoots it off the catch, the way that he can create his own shot. His strength, his length, his ability to separate, to get his own jump shot and also get to the rim.
"He’s second in the country in drawing fouls, he just he lives at the foul line. He’s a heck of a player, and it’s a great story too you know considering the level at which he was considered coming out of high school."
Defensively, Arkansas is the No. 1 three-point defensive team in the country, with opponents only shooting 25.3 percent from distance.
"I think that they’re really athletic," said White. "I think they’ve got really good versatility defensively. They can switch a lot of different spots. I think their frontcourt guys are as quick and fast as any frontcourt in our league. Good speed and quickness and length in the backcourt. They extend, they pressure you. Often times you’ll see teams that turn you over as often as they do also defend the three because they’re out there. They’re extended, their defense is extended. I think they’re leading the league in turnover margin if I’m not mistaken, and steals.
"At the same time running guys off the three and making threes contested. They’ve got a lot of stats that we’re really impressed with."
The Gators host Arkansas on Tuesday at 7 p.m. ET.
