The road woes returned for Florida basketball on Saturday in Nashville as the Gators were unable to put away a tenacious Vanderbilt Commodores team, allowing the home squad to hang around long enough to seize a 79-78 last-minute victory.
In ESPN’s latest Basketball Power Index update following the loss, the Orange and Blue actually rose a spot from our previous update to No. 26; it also represents a one-spot increase from Saturday’s pregame rankings. That puts Todd Golden’s team between the No. 25 Villanova Wildcats and No. 27 TCU Horned Frogs.
Florida’s BPI rating — a measurement of a team’s true strength moving forward — fell 0.1 points to 11.9 since the last update. The offensive BPI fell 0.2 points to 8.4 while the defensive BPI inched up 0.1 points to 3.5.
Florida is a No. 6 seed in the Southeastern Conference Tournament, giving it a first-round bye and matching the Gators up with the winner of Game 2 on Thursday, March 14, inside Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee. Tipoff is slated for a late 9:30 p.m. ET start on the SEC Network.
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