What could possibly justify not playing Riley Kugel tonight?

UF is in SEC play now and RK continues to struggle. I am losing optimism he will "break out of it".

 

I remember it, I kept thinking, do these guys know if teams are any good or do they just look at their phones to see if we are favored. They played unfocused. Another player black-eye for UF in the age of NIL/transfer portal. Our front court other than Condon, is killing us. No fight, not playing smart and not scoring has limited us to hero ball like CMW made famous and doesn’t work. every time I hear he wants us to play fast, I shudder.
people like Riley flipping bullets from three or four feet away, Walter, Samuels, Handlogten all have been turn it over at an alarming rate, but remember, we like to “play fast!”. Not a winning formula. We need a good half court offense spread out like Ole Miss, but we don’t have the players for it. We can’t run the whole game and play great defense either, this we are seeing every time we hit the court. Only a veteran coach makes the changes to stop the madness. If we lose to Arkansas at home the press will have a field day on our program and coach, just like CBN and the football team this year. We are the butt of jokes in sports now. I never thought the UF would be in this position. We are on the bottom and digging a deeper hole so we can hide in it. LOL

 

Totally agree, I'm over the diamond in the rough approach in all sports. It would require $$ though and a change in admin leadership. It would be an interesting exercise to evaluate the 2 approaches and outcomes.

 

How can you justify stating Oral Roberts was inferior or somehow unworthy, other than budget and other money issues?

 

I know Riley is everyone’s “ whipping boy” right now because he’s polarizing. Clayton, since he plays more minutes & has the ball in his hands much more than RK, has me more concerned.

Clayton’s been loose with the basketball a little too much to my liking, all season. It also seems to get worse in pressure situations.

When he shoots well, it gets masked somewhat, but it is an issue.

Todd’s about to earn his paycheck. The pieces are not fitting together well right now.

I’m still hopeful we get on track, but I have to say, with so many little things needing improvement, it’s gonna be tough sledding.

 

Right now Florida is 124th in D1 in assist to turnover ratio at 1.22. We are 318th in free throw shooting at 65.38%, 204th in 3 point shooting at 33.04%, 226th in 3 point defense at 33.90%, 147th in field goal defense at 42.533%, 104th in field goal shooting at 46.43%, 13th in rebound margin at 10 per game, 296th in turnover margin at -1.7, 296th in scoring defense at 76.5 ppg., 40th in fast break ppg. at 14.4, 236th in fouls per game at 17.7, 10th in scoring offense at 86.1 ppg. and 102nd in bench scoring at 24.47 ppg. Lots of flaws in this team and I'm not sure how they can all be fixed at nearly the mid-point of the season.

 

Hey Saban’s available!

 

It is only deflating if you weren't expecting this outcome. We're one-level down in the athleticism needed to go on the road and beat a really good SEC team.

This game validated where I think this team's ceiling is, and who we are athletically.

I am still enjoying seeing this team play though! We'll definitely win a game as an underdog, and we'll likely lose a bad SEC game....we're on the cusp, but not there yet.

 

I think you’re right, he does. Transfers look at the SEC as a stepping stone, but they only look good if the team succeeds…and the team doesn’t succeed with a porous, undisciplined defense

 

We sucked last night. It was a team effort.

As for Kugel watching him during warm-ups makes me think that he has some recurring tightness issues that need PT and he isn't 100%. I even saw him at one game with a foam roller and for those that have never used one they are not pleasant. They hurt like hell.

 

Unworthy? Where did you get that from? I’m not going to research it but UF was the higher seed and we had a big lead in the 2nd half with ORU obviously gassed. Then, for some reason, White backed off the pace and we lost all momentum and lost.
I don’t understand your point. I have no animus towards Oral Roberts whatsoever.

 

While we are all concerned about our Gators, I am with you about Condon. This guy supposedly has not been playing hoops long. I love his game.
He will be an absolute stud next year IMO.

 

Gave up 60% shooting. Horrific defense to put it bluntly. More games like that and Todd will not be long here

 

Absolutely. Never underestimate the fire and grit needed to play at a high level in Aussie Rules. Add his height and rapidly impriving game acumen and his upside is very, very high.

 

He's had a few of those lazy passes this year. For someone who excelled under Pitino it's surprising, and maddening.

 

Hopefully a come to Jesus moment accomplished...

 

PLEASE be true. The team could really use a spark from him in particular.

 

agreed - Riley has all the talent in the world but has unfortunately played some extremely brain dead basketball so far this year. He keeps trying to force spectacular plays that aren't there over and over and might as well have a flashing neon sign over his head telling defenders what he's about to do most of the time.

outside of a couple games his play has had a mostly negative impact when he's on the court, so at this point in the season I don't have any problem at all with Golden cutting his minutes.