Florida basketball is in dire need of another Southeastern Conference win after starting the calendar year 1-3. Further exacerbating the Gators’ issues is their inability to play outside of the O’Connell Center, with five of their six losses coming away from Gainesville.
The good news is that Todd Golden’s next opponent looks to be ripe for the pickings… if his team can get their act together on the road. The Missouri Tigers are just 8-9 overall and winless in four tries against SEC competition while going just 6-4 at home so far.
Using the Basketball Power Index, ESPN is giving the Gators 58.0% odds to come out on top by a projected 2.2 points over the Tigers. The matchup quality earned an 83.9-point grade, putting it in the top fifth of the games being played on Saturday.
“BPI is a measure of team strength that is meant to be the best predictor of performance going forward,” the site reads. “BPI represents how many points above or below average a team is… Game predictions account for opponent strength, pace of play, site, travel distance, day’s rest and altitude, and are used to simulate the season 10,000 times to produce season projections.”
The game will be of the Quadrant 2 variety for Florida, which is ranked No. 52 in the NET rankings on Thursday before the game as well as for Missouri, which is ranked No. 117.
Florida travels to Columbia, Missouri, to take on the Tigers on Saturday, Jan. 20. Tipoff is slated for a late 8 p.m. ET start and will be broadcast on ESPNU.
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