No. 19 Florida at South Carolina

 
* When: Wednesday, 9 p.m. (ET)
* Where: Colonial Arena / Columbia, S.C.
* Records: Florida (14-6, 5-2) / South Carolina (11-9, 2-5)
* Series/Last meeting: Florida leads 50-29, including a sweep of their home-and-home meetings last season. The Gators defeated the Gamecocks 70-69 on Jan. 22, 2025 at Columbia, when senior guard Will Richard attacked the lane and threw in a high-banking go-ahead layup with 4.8 seconds left. The two met three weeks later in Gainesville, Feb. 15, where UF won comfortably, 88-67, behind 20 points and six rebounds from forward Thomas Haugh, plus a career-high 22 points from guard Denzel Aberdeen, who bombed five of seven from the 3-point line. The game was notable for the emotional return of 7-foot-1 backup center Micah Handlogten, who halted what was supposed to be a medical-redshirt season to rejoin the active roster and bolster an injured front line. In his return, Handlogten scored two points, grabbed eight rebounds and blocked two shots. 
* TV: SEC Network (Roy Philpott and Rodney Terry)
* Radio: Gator Sports Network from LEARFIELD / Stations list
  (with Sean Kelley, Brian Hogan and Steve Egan) 
* Ticket info

---

Projected Starters

 

Florida	Position	Height / Weight	Class	Statistics
Alex Condon	F	6-11 / 230	Junior	13.4 pts / 8.1 reb
Rueben Chinyelu	C	6-10 / 255	Junior	11.9 pts / 11.0 reb
Thomas Haugh	F	6-9 / 215	Junior	17.4 pts / 6.7 reb
Xaivian Lee	G	6-4 / 185	Senior	11.2 pts / 4.0 reb
Boogie Fland	G	6-3 / 185	Sophomore	11.2 pts / 2.4 reb / 3.6 ast

South Carolina	Position	Height / Weight	Class	Statistics
Elijah Strong	F	6-8 / 250	Junior	xx pts / xx reb
Mike Sharavjamts	G	6-9 / 195	Senior	xx pts / xx reb
Myles Stute	G	6-7 / 221	Graduate	xx pts / xx reb
Kobe Knox	G	6-5 / 200	R-Senior	xx pts / xx reb
Meechie Johnson	G	6-2 / 192	Senior	xx pts / x reb / xx ast

The Setup

No. 19 Florida and South Carolina face off in a Southeastern Conference game, with the Gators looking to shake off Saturday’s disappointing home loss to Auburn. … The Gators, who dropped three spots in this week’s Associated Press Top 25 poll, fell out of a first-place tie with Texas A&M and started the week in a three-way tie for second with Kentucky and Arkansas. They also had a five-game winning streak (and 16-game home streak, dating more than a year) snapped by the Tigers, who took the fight to the home team and controlled the game from its outset. The Gamecocks, meanwhile, are tied for 14th in the league standings, having lost four of five, most recently Saturday’s 92-69 road blowout at the hands of front-running A&M. … UF has won four of the previous five in the series, including two on the road. … Gators coach Todd Golden is 4-1 against the Gamecocks (1-1 on the road).

Tale of the Tape

Florida	Statistics	South Carolina
85.2	Scoring	78.4
.459	Field-goal percentage	.457
.285	3-point percentage	.322
72.3	Scoring defense	73.0
.419	Field-goal percentage defense	.438
.334	3-point percentage defense	.298
11th	KenPom.com overall ranking	77th
18th	KenPom.com offensive efficiency	84th
13th	KenPom.com defensive efficiency	82nd
70th	KenPom.com adjusted tempo	262nd
16th	NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET) ranking	91st
4th	Overall strength of schedule ranking	86th

The Breakdown 

About the Gators: The 67 points in the Auburn loss marked the second-fewest scored this season, as well as the fewest scored at home in 40 games. That number came about despite a 39-32 advantage on the boards and just 11 turnovers. That’s because UF shot just 46.9% from the 2-point area, had its usual poor 3-point game (7 of 27) and a second straight bad performance at the free-throw line (16 of 27). … Florida remains in the KenPom top 20 in both offensive and defensive efficiency, ranks second nationally in both offensive and defensive rebounding and 348th (still 79th out of 79 power conference programs) from the 3-point line at 28.5%. … UF is 30-for-54 from the free-throw line the last two games. That’s 55.5% and unsustainable going forward. … The Gators need a bounce-back from forward Alex Condon, the team’s second-leading scorer who Saturday against Auburn struggled with the Tigers’ physicality on the way to missing all four of his field-goal attempts and finishing with one point and four turnovers. It was his lowest-scoring output since — coincidentally — UF’s win over Auburn in the 2025 Final Four, though he was instrumental with his energy and defensive play in the post that day. … Thomas Haugh equaled his career high of 27 points and 10 rebounds for his fourth double-double of the season, the eighth of his career. … Center Rueben Chinyelu, meanwhile, had his run of four consecutive double doubles halted, as the SEC’s top glass man finished with 10 points and seven boards. … Point guard Boogie Fland had eight points, but missed all four of his 3s, giving him a dozen games this season when he’s 0-for-2 from the arc or worse. He did have five assists vs. zero turnovers to run his assist-to-turnover ratio in SEC play to 37-to-9 (better than 4-to-1). … Guard Xaivian Lee hit a couple 3s on his was to scoring seven points, but had three turnovers (two of them so-called pick-6s) and was one of four UF players to miss at least two free throws. … Backup guard Urban Klavzar has hit at least one 3-pointer in 10 consecutive games, but is coming off a 2-for-10 effort against Auburn. In fairness, his last few attempts were in desperation time and weren’t the best shots. He’s currently at 36.4% on the season, with 13 games of multiple makes from deep. … After Klavzar, center Micah Handlogten (4.5 ppg, 6.2 rpg) and guard Isaiah Brown (4.7 ppg, 2.6 rpg) were the lone bench players to check in, but they combined for just 17 minutes, two points and four rebounds. 

About the Gamecocks: Their in the fourth season under Lamont Paris, who made the jump from Tennessee-Chattanooga in 2022, was named SEC Coach of the Year in ’24 after guiding the team to a 26-8 mark and NCAA Tournament berth, but fell back to 12-20 last season, with just two conference wins. Paris’ record at USC is 60-58 overall, including 21-38 in conference play. … South Carolina is a solid 2-point team at 57.6%, excellent at the free-throw line in shooting 78.7 (that’s 9th in the country) and does not turn the ball over much. They also don’t create much disruption on defense or rebound very well. … The Gamecocks played one of the easiest non-league schedules among power conference teams in going 9-4, with the average KenPom ranking of their nine victims at 293.5. Their two SEC wins came at LSU and home last week against Oklahoma, but USC was in tight games into the final minute at home against Georgia and at Auburn. … Point guard Meechie Johnson is a fascinating portal case. He started his career at Ohio State, transferred to South Carolina for two years, then went back to Ohio State for a year and — guess what? — went back to South Carolina. He’s solid from deep (35.2%) — Johnson beat UF on a late 3-ball two years ago — and excellent at drawing fouls and getting ot the line, where he makes nearly 81%.  … In Mike Sharavjamts UF will face its second “Portal Grand Slam” guy (four schools in four years) in as many games. He’s a tall guard who hits nearly 63% from 2, but is not a great shooter from deep (29.6). … Guard Myles Stute started his career at Vanderbilt in 2020, doing three years with the Commodores and now his third with the Gamecocks. Of his 118 shot attempts this season, only 21 have been inside the arc. There’s a reason for that: Stute is a career 37.1% shooter from distance (37.9 this season). … Tampa product Kobe Knox is in his first season at USC after transferring from South Florida. He’s making 63% of his 2s. … Guard Elijah Strong has taken 34.8% of the team’s shots this season. That’s the fourth-highest percentage in the country. He’s 55.4 from 2. … Freshman EJ Walker (3.3 ppg, 2.0 rpg), who goes 6-7, 253 pounds, is the top front-court guy off the bench  

 

Numbers of Note 

* .303 — The 3-point shooting percentage of the ’21-22 Florida team, Coach Mike White’s last with the Gators, which ranks as the program’s worst since the NCAA added a universal 3-point line for 1986-87 season. This ’25-26 team, however, is threatening that infamous statistic by nearly two percentage points. 

* 22 — Double doubles by UF players this season, which irates as the most for the program since the ’06-07 back-to-back NCAA championship squad posted 27.

* 2017 — The year Florida and South Carolina met in the NCAA East Region title game at Madison Square Garden, where the Gamecocks rallied from 14 down in the second half to defeat the Gators and clinch their first trip to the Final Four. Senior guard Sindarius Thornwell scored 26 points, grabbed seven rebounds and keyed a second-half defense that shut the Gators down from the 3-point line, as UF missed all 14 of their attempts after the break to deny White’s second UF team a berth to the NCAA semifinals. 

 

Bottom Line

Got to leave Saturday’s disappointment back in Gainesville. 

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