Hall of Fame Series

No. 3 Florida vs. No. 13 Arizona

 
* When: Monday, 7 p.m. (ET)
* Where: T-Mobile Arena / Las Vegas
* Records: Florida (0-0) / Arizona (0-0)
* Series history: Tied at 2-2. The Gators and Wildcats last played as part of a home-and-home series, with each team holding serve on its floor. Florida won 78-72 in overtime on Dec. 7, 2011 at the O’Connell Center, while Arizona staged an improbable comeback — down six inside a minute to play — with a run of seven straight points (off three straight UF turnovers) to steal of 65-64 win over the unbeaten and 12th-ranked Gators at Tucson.     
* TV: TNT (Brian Anderson, Grant Hill and Andy Katz)
* Radio: Gator Sports Network from LEARFIELD / Stations list
  (with Sean Kelley, Brian Hogan and Steve Egan) 
* Ticket info

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Projected Starters

 

Florida	Position	Height / Weight	Class	2024-25 Statistics
Alex Condon	F	6-11 / 230	Junior	10.6 pts / 7.5 reb
Rueben Chinyelu	C	6-11 / 265	Junior	6.0 pts / 6.5 reb
Thomas Haugh	F	6-9 / 215	Junior	9.8 pts / 6.1 reb
Xaivian Lee	G	6-4 / 180	Senior	16.9 pts / 6.1 reb / 5.5 ast (at Princeton)
Boogie Fland	G	6-3 / 185	Sophomore	13.5 pts / 3.2 reb / 5.1 ast (at Arkansas)

Arizona	Position	Height / Weight	Class	2024-25 Statistics
Koa Peat	F	6-8 / 235	Freshman	N/A
Motiejus Krivas	C	7-2 / 260	Junior	7.9 pts / 4.5 reb
Anthony Dell’Orso	G	6-6 / 205	Senior	7.2 pts / 1.4 reb
Brayden Burries	G	6-4 / 205	Freshman	N/A
Jaden Bradley	G	6-3 / 200	Senior	12.1 pts / 3.4 reb / 3.7 ast

The Setup

The 2025-26 season opener for both teams will be part of the Hall of Fame Series, which will host similar events in Baltimore, Los Angeles, Boston and Phoenix over the next six weeks. The UF-Arizona showdown will serve as the front end of a double-header, with Villanova vs. No. 8 Brigham Young (led by burgeoning NIL freshman superstar AJ Dybantsa), the nightcap. While the Gators, in just the third season under Coach Todd Golden (76-33), won the 2025 national championship, the Wildcats, in the fourth season under Tommy Lloyd (112-33), went 24-13, lost to NCAA runner-up Houston in the Big 12 Tournament title game and, as the No. 4 seed in the NCAA East Region, advanced to the Sweet 16 before falling to top-seeded Duke. The Wildcats, are in a mix of teams — along with Texas Tech, Iowa State, Kansas and BYU — considered contenders in the Big 12, with Houston the odds-on favorite to win the league. The UF-Arizona game will be the only one in the country on college basketball’s debut night featuring two ranked teams.

Tale of the Tape

 

Florida	2024-25 Statistics (*Preseason KenPom.com numbers)	Arizona
84.9	Scoring	82.5
.471	Field-goal percentage	.474
.356	3-point percentage	.338
69.6	Scoring defense	72.3
.400	Field-goal percentage defense	.419
.294	3-point percentage defense	.340
2nd	*KenPom.com overall ranking	15th
3rd	*KenPom.com projected offensive efficiency	11th
6th	*KenPom.com projected defensive efficiency	22nd
37th	*KenPom.com projected adjusted tempo	19th
N/A	NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET) ranking	N/A
N/A	Overall strength of schedule ranking	N/A

The Breakdown 

Florida returns four of the top eight players from its NCAA-champion rotation. All four, led by first-team preseason All American Alex Condon and postseason hero Thomas Haugh, are from a front court (along with starter center Rueben Chinyelu and super-sub 7-1 center Micah Handlogten) that could be the best in the nation. Three of the four will be on the floor the majority of the game, which should make the Gators one of the best rebounding teams in the country, especially on the offensive end. … All eyes will be on UF’s new backcourt of transfers Boogie Fland (formerly of Arkansas) and Xaivian Lee (Princeton). Fland will be the primary point guard, but Lee will get plenty of chances on the ball. Their ability to knock down shots like last season’s sharp-shooting backcourt, especially second-chance opportunities off offensive rebounds, will go a long ways toward determining if the Gators are a really good team or championship caliber again. … Backup junior shooting guard Urban Klavzar has had tremendous offseason shooting the ball and it carried over into both of the team’s closed-scrimmage victories with a flurry of 3s. … UF freshman wing CJ Ingram is the team’s rookie to watch, but don’t sleep on classmate and guard Alex Lloyd, who has the look of a prospect who could get better as the season rolls on, provided he earns the opportunity.

Arizona has three starters back, with guard Jaden Bradley, who transferred from Alabama two years ago, the key returnee. He scored 23 points on 7-for-11 shooting, making both his 3 attempts, in the team’s 81-68 exhibition defeat of Saint Mary’s two weeks ago. … Forward Tobe Awaka, who averaged 8.0 points and a team-best 7.8 rebounds in 36 starts after transferring from Tennessee last season, sat out the exhibition games with an injury, leaving Lloyd to take a long look at talented Lithuanian big man Motiejus Krivas, who is healthy after undergoing season-ending foot surgery last January. … Arizona signed a six-member freshman class that was rated among the top-five nationally, with McDonald’s All Americans Koa Peat and Brayden Burries already in the starting lineup. One of those freshman, Bryce James is the son of LeBron James, but is not expected to play. Both Peat, the chiseled forward, and Burries, an offensviely skilled guard, scored 10 points on 5-for-7 shooting against Saint Mary’s, while Burries had seven rebounds and a couple steals.

 

Numbers of Note 

* 7 — Active NCAA coaches with national championships: Kansas’s Bill Self (2008, 2020); Connecticut’s Dan Hurley (2023, 2024); St. John’s Rick Pitino (Kentucky 1996); Michigan State’s Tom Izzo (2000); Arkansas’s John Calipari (Kentucky 2012); Baylor’s Scott Drew (2021); Florida’s Todd Golden (2025)

* 11 — Consecutive wins by the Gators against teams ranked in the Associated Press top 25, a run that includes seven straight over top 10 opponents and four over teams in the top five.

* 12,948 — Road mileage to and from UF’s seven road or neutral site non-league games the next two months. For context, the Gators traveled just over 16,000 miles during the entire 2024-25 season and did not eclipse the 13,000-mile mark until their trip to Raleigh, North Carolina for the opening rounds of the NCAA Tournament.   

 

Bottom Line

This should be fun (both this game and the season). OK, maybe not as fun as last year (that would be a tough ask), but the possibilities for another wildly successful season are certainly there.  

Email senior writer Chris Harry at chrish@gators.ufl.edu Find his story archives here.