The college basketball bracketologies, bubble watches and objective rankings have all started to favor the Florida Gators in recent days thanks to a pair of major victories that signaled the arrival of Todd Golden’s team.
Over the past two weeks, the Orange and Blue have played three games thanks to a bye, having beaten the Kentucky Wildcats in overtime inside Rupp Arena while blowing out the Auburn Tigers inside the O’Connell Center. Their only blemish in that stretch was a last-minute loss at the Texas A&M Aggies that should have been won.
With the Auburn win under its belt, Florida made some headway in John Gasaway’s latest bubble watch update for ESPN, in which the Gators are now among the “should be in” category among their Southeastern Conference peers.
“There was a case to be made that Florida was being undervalued by bracket projections even before the Gators won by 15 at home against Auburn. A similar dynamic surfaced at more or less this same point in the bubble season last year with Kentucky,” Gasaway notes.
“In any event, Todd Golden’s team was being shown as ‘last four in’ material while carrying stronger rankings than that in several of the NCAA’s preferred metrics,” he continues. “It’s possible the projected seed and the rankings might begin to converge just as they did a year ago with Kentucky.”
In his last update, the Gators were among the teams with “work to do” — the final tier. It looks like Golden’s gang is trending the right direction as the NCAA Tournament picture comes into focus.
Next up for the Gators are the LSU Tigers, who come to Gainesville to take on Florida inside the O’Connell Center on Tuesday, Feb. 13. Tipoff is scheduled for 8 p.m. ET and the game will be broadcast on the SEC Network.
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