He was just a toddler at the time, but that didn’t stop Mike White from taking it to his father, Kevin, on the basketball court.
“(I) might have been 3 years old,” Mike White said on Monday. “Dad, he wasn’t a hooper.”
Now, many years removed from battling it out on a driveway hoop, the father and son will face off once again.
White, now in his second year as Florida’s head basketball coach, will take his No. 21-ranked Gators (7-1) to New York City to face No. 5 Duke (8-1) under the bright lights of Madison Square Garden tonight at 9.
White’s father took over as Duke’s director of athletics in 2008 after former AD Joe Alleva accepted the same position at LSU.
But the younger White said he’s not concerned with the pressure of facing his father — or Duke’s College Basketball Hall of Fame coach Mike Krzyzewski.
“I promise you … it’s not about that,” White said. “There’s so many challenges ahead with facing a program like Duke that if you’re thinking about the wrong things, you give yourselves zero chances at success.”
Those challenges?
Luke Kennard. Frank Jackson. Amile Jefferson. And, most importantly, wrapped in a 6-foot-5, 202-pound package of pure athleticism and offensive skill, junior shooting guard Grayson Allen.
Florida’s defense will be tasked with slowing down a No. 21-ranked scoring offense that boasts at least four players who average double-digit scoring.
Kennard leads the Blue Devils with 19.4 points per game, and Allen is right behind at 17.1 points per game.
Jefferson has been Duke’s most versatile player. The 6-foot-9 forward is averaging 14.7 points, 9.8 rebounds and two blocks per game in his senior season.
“I’m not gonna lie. Our guys are gonna be so jacked up,” White said. “I’d be very, very surprised if we don’t come out and play really, really hard and be excited about the challenge and the opportunity.”
For UF guard Canyon Barry, this opportunity represents the chance to take part in a family legacy.
Barry’s father, NBA Hall-of-Famer Rick Barry, played in the Garden multiple times during his career and once dropped 57 points in the historic arena against the Knicks during his rookie season.
“The key is just to stay locked in,” the younger Barry said. “Obviously Duke has a lot of scoring potential with the great players they have, so defense is going to be a big key for us.”
In addition to stopping a potent Duke offense, the Gators will have to figure out how to score themselves.
Although Florida is averaging a respectable 77 points per game, the Gators are shooting 44 percent from the field and just 31.5 percent from three.
Barry added that, under the conditions of playing in a world-famous arena against one of history’s greatest college basketball programs, maintaining composure will be essential.
“We know that it’s a bigger game. It’s Madison Square Garden. It’s Duke,” he said. “I think that’s going to be one of the challenges.
“How well we can regulate that excitement and energy level and play within ourselves … and just execute the gameplan that coach White and the staff has laid out.”
Contact Ray Boone at rboone@alligator.org and follow him on Twitter @rboone1994.
Florida coach Mike White calls out instructions to his team during Florida's 88-79 loss to Kentucky on March 1, 2016, in the O'Connell Center.
