Last Thursday, Mike White took the court of the O’Connell Center for the first time as Florida’s head coach. In an 89-42 exhibition game victory over Division II Palm Beach Atlantic, White observed his team’s strengths and weaknesses in a game situation just eight days before the regular season began.
As the Gators prepare to take on Navy in the season-opener on Friday night at 9:30 in Annapolis, Maryland, White knows the adjustments his team needs to make from the exhibition game to start the season off on the right foot.
"I think everyone in the O’Dome knew we weren’t handling the basketball and making great decisions the way we need to to be a successful team," White said of the Gators’ performance against Palm Beach Atlantic. "Every team in the country has deficiencies right now."
Turnovers and free-throw shooting were Florida’s glaring deficiencies in the exhibition game victory.
The Gators turned the ball over 23 times and shot just 10-of-27 from the charity stripe.
But besides those two weaknesses, Florida ran the floor well on offense and applied heavy pressure on defense, shooting 57.6 percent from the field and forcing 30 turnovers.
For help on free throws, White is looking to a higher power, although he doesn’t believe Thursday night’s numbers properly reflect the team’s ability.
"Oh my goodness. Pray more, I guess," White said. "You just hope that the percentages you shoot in practice would carry over to the games, so I’m not ready to just jump to a conclusion too early that it’s a major issue for us yet; I’m hopeful that we can correct it for Friday night."
As for the turnovers, redshirt junior DeVon Walker, who missed all of last season with a torn ACL, may speak for many of his younger teammates when he said excitement and nerves might have taken over in his first game back.
"I was too excited. I was too excited to be back out. I think I was too excited in a bad way, my rhythm and everything was just sped up," Walker said. "Now that that’s out of the way, we got that experience out of the way, we can just use it and now we can just get back to playing basketball as we know."
The Gators did not head into their first game week unscathed.
Redshirt senior forward Alex Murphy suffered a partially torn plantar fascia in his right foot against Palm Beach Atlantic and will miss four-to-six weeks.
Transfer forward Justin Leon was also banged up in Thursday’s game and White said he was unsure yet if Leon would be able to play in Friday’s season opener.
White said those injuries will give freshmen Keith Stone and Kevarrius Hayes more opportunities to play and that he’ll be using multiple lineups during practice this week.
White said losing Murphy — a fifth-year senior — is also a blow to the team.
"Here comes another hit for him, and he’s really been in a good groove shooting the basketball," White said. "He’s as much of a leader as we have on this team. Brings it vocally to practice every day more than anyone."
Injuries aside, the Gators are focused on working on their weaknesses and earning White his first regular-season win as Florida’s head coach on Friday against Navy.
"Honestly, I don’t think there’s a word in the Webster dictionary for that," Walker said on starting the season. "I’m beyond excited, not only for me, but for the coaches, for the guys. I think it’s great to start this journey with one another, at Navy, it’s a great place to start it."
Follow Alex Maminakis on Twitter @alexmaminakis
UF men's basketball coach Mike White talks with redshirt freshman guard Brandone Francis-Ramirez during the first half of Florida's 89-42 win against Palm Beach Atlantic in an exhibition game Nov. 5, 2015, in the O'Connell Center.
