Florida basketball dropped its Southeastern Conference road opener on Wednesday night in a 103-85 shellacking at the hands of the Ole Miss Rebels in Oxford, Mississippi. The Gators got out to an early lead but the REbs took the reins and rode out from there to send their opponents to 10-5 overall this season.
Predictably, the objective rankings disapproved of the results and rightfully penalized Todd Golden’s gang for their lackluster effort. In ESPN’s latest Basketball Power Index update, Florida fell six spots to No. 34 overall, sitting between the No. 33 St. John’s Red Storm and No. 35 Providence Friars.
Florida’s BPI rating — a measurement of a team’s true strength moving forward — slipped 0.5 points to 9.3. The offensive BPI moved up 0.3 points to 6.5 but the defense dropped 0.7 points to 2.9.
The win-loss projection fell to 18.8-12.2, with a lowered 8.9-9.1 prediction for the conference schedule. ESPN now gives Florida a bare 0.1% chance to win the Southeastern Conference while the remaining strength of schedule ranked No. 41.
Next up for the Gators are the Arkansas Razorbacks, who come to the O’Connell Center on Saturday, Jan. 13. Tipoff is scheduled for 4 pm ET and the game will be broadcast on ESPN.
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