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The Florida Gators men’s basketball team has been on the rise the past couple of weeks thanks to a pair of marquee wins over the Tennessee Volunteers and the West Virginia Mountaineers, ranked No. 6 and No. 11 at the time of defeat, respectively, and their success has been reflected in the latest Ferris Mowers Coaches Poll and AP Poll.
Now ranked No. 23 and No. 22 in those two polls, respectively, UF appears poised to make some postseason noise both in the Southeastern Conference and NCAA Tournaments this spring. However, before Gators fans get too excited about Florida’s recent surge, at this point nothing is guaranteed and there are plenty of games left to play.
The Athletic published its NCAA Tournament bubble watch on Tuesday, which surveyed the entire Division I field by conference. While the Alabama Crimson Tide, Tennessee Volunteers and Missouri Tigers currently stand as “should be in” teams, Florida sits in the next tier with “work to do” along with the LSU Tigers and Arkansas Razorbacks.
Here is what staff writer Eammon Brennan had to say about the Gators.
Florida (10-4, 6-3; NET: 18, SOS: 57): Huge win for Florida last weekend. West Virginia is a quality team, and one that registers as a high-end Quadrant 1 victory on the road. That was Florida’s fourth win in a row too, a stretch that began with a 75-49 win over Tennessee. The Gators have always been hard to get a feel for under Mike White; they’ve frequently had good per-possession numbers, but jumbled records and a certain lack of obvious identity. But this team makes some sense. Against West Virginia, a good defensive team, Florida scored 1.20 points per possession, which tracks with what the Gators have been good at in the SEC too — this is, save Alabama, the best shooting team in the league.
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