Gorjok Gak (12), working against Georgia center Nick Claxton in January 2018, sat out the entire 2018-19 season after undergoing knee surgery to correct chronic pain.
Gak is Back, Ready for More
Friday, June 14, 2019 | Men's Basketball, Chris Harry
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By: Chris Harry, Senior Writer
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The magic-marker scribble on the wall-sized grease board in the basketball office of assistant coach Darris Nichols' is faded, but still legible 13 months later.
I will be in the gym everyday!
—Gak 5/16/18
Yes, Gorjok Gak made that written pledge in the early stages of recovery after his knee surgery in April 2018, a procedure he underwent once the Florida basketball team concluded its 2017-18 season. He made good on it, too, albeit with limitations. Considerable limitations.
"He definitely tried, I'll give him that," Nichols said.
The 6-foot-11, 254-pound Gak, accompanied by a manager, did daily form-shooting while seated in a chair in an empty gym, and was a fixture on the sidelines during practices (when not in the weight or training rooms). Ultimately, though, he played in zero games during a third collegiate season. The last time Gak got between the lines when it counted was UF's loss to Texas Tech in the 2018 NCAA Tournament, when he played five minutes, grabbed three rebounds and did not score. That was nearly 15 months ago.
That's a lot of days in the gym, but virtually known actually playing basketball.
"But I feel like I learned a lot about basketball last season. I actually got a greater appreciation of what makes a team and how older guys have to hold younger guys accountable," Gak said. "No, I wouldn't say [the season] was a waste, not at all. There are things I can apply to this year."
Gorjok Gak (center) was parked on the UF bench during the entire 2018-19 season.
The application began in earnest this week when Gak, after taking a month off to visit his brother in Miami and parents in Sydney, Australia following the spring semester, returned to UF and commenced offseason workouts and individual instruction drills with UF associate head coach Al Pinkins. Gak took reps with fellow post men Dontay Bassett and Isaiah Stokes. Most importantly, he took all of his reps. He was not only in full sweat, but cleared to go full-speed. Gak, who also got in his weight-lifting and running in the morning, did four straight days of work without any pain.
"It feels great," he said. "I could not have done that during the season."
Gak could not have done four minutes during last season. So what should the Gators expect to have in Gak, who this fall will be a fourth-year junior with career averages of 7.7 minutes, 2.0 points and 2.1 rebounds over 44 games? It's a complicated question. Not only is the sample size small, but a healthy version of Gak has not been on the floor since March 2017 when he was a seldom-used true freshman still very much trying to figure things out.
Pinkins, who oversees UF's big men, has never had a healthy Gak to work with, so what he's seeing now — in post-up, duck-in, jump-hook and square-up shooting drills, among the like — is really his first true look at Gak. Pinkins was an assistant at LSU when he recruited Gak out of Bradenton (Fla.) Victory Rock Prep, where he used his 7-4 wingspan to average 13.9 points, 9.3 rebounds and was viewed by schools as a project type, with some promising skill and feel for the game. When Pinkins was an assistant at Texas Tech in 2018, he had the Florida advance scout for their NCAA Tournament game, so he got some further familiarity with the backup big, who Pinkins knew had been hobbled all season by injury.
When Pinkins got to Gainesville last spring, he watched tape of every second Gak had been on the floor for UF, every shot he took, every rebound grabbed, every box-out, every post move.
Now, he's seeing it all and honing it, hands-on style.
"He is what I thought he was; long and lanky and skilled enough for the center position," Pinkins said. "His stroke is good and he's good passer. With more work, but more importantly, more confidence, I think he can be a good player. But he has to have the confidence that he can go make plays around the rim."
It may just be a matter of rediscovering that confidence, then building on it.
Flashback: On March 18, 2017, the fourth-seeded Gators played No. 5-seed Virginia in the NCAA Tournament at Orlando. Gak went 3-for-3 from the floor and grabbed two rebounds in 10 minutes of Florida's blowout win while matched mostly against another freshman by the name of Mamadi Diakite. Anyone heard of him? Anyone watch the Cavaliers during the 2019 NCAA Tournament?
Virginia's Mamadi Diakite can only watch as Gorjok Gak thunders home a slam during Florida's 65-39 win in the 2017 NCAA Tournament East Region at Orlando.
Five months later, Gak was playing for the Australia national team in the World University Games in Taiwan. Two games into the international tournament, Gak's right knee ballooned unexpectedly — without an incident of trauma — but he received treatment and played on. Played well, too. Gak averaged 11.1 points and 8.3 rebounds over eight tournament games, a lot of them against international professionals, and returned to the U.S. feeling good about the his all-around development.
When the Gators opened the '17-18 season, Gak scored a career-high 12 points in 12 minutes against Gardner-Webb, then started the next game against North Florida and went 4-for-4 from the floor. The UF coaches thought they might have their stop-gap while awaiting the midseason return of fifth-year senior center John Egbunu, who'd suffered a season-ending knee injury the February before.
But Gak's knee issues that first surfaced in Taiwan became chronic in Gainesville. Meanwhile, Egbunu had repeated setbacks and never returned from his injury. Gak was able to play, but only limited minutes due to pain the rest of the season (five DNPs along the way), with his highlight a nice 6-point, 4-rebound effort off the bench in UF's defeat of Kentucky in the regular-season finale.
Gak underwent surgery a few weeks later. Basically, a debridement to clean up the knee.
"My goal was to be ready for the start of the season, but that didn't work out," Gak said.
No, it did not. Gak was never pain-free. And even though he began the season on the shelf, Gak and trainer Dave Werner targeted a return for UF's Dec. 22 game against Florida Gulf Coast at Sunrise, Fla. When that didn't happen — and was not even close to happening — the parties agreed the best thing to do was shut down for the season, eventually apply for a medical redshirt and focus on nothing but rehab and conditioning. The latter was particularly important, as Gak's inactivity had him tipping the scales at 267 pounds.
"I didn't think I was fat, just big," Gak said.
Countered UF strength and conditioning coordinator Preston Greene: "There's a word for that. It's called 'denial.' "
There was a treatment for it, also. Gak, limited in what he could do on the gym floor, went to work in the weight room, using a routine Greene called "reverse broad pyramid" that involved stationary rowing and biking. Not for pleasure, either.
The program: Row 500 meters, then bike off 10 calories; row 400 meters, bike off 20 calories; row 300 meters, bike off 30 calories; row 200 meters, bike off 40 calories; row 100 meters, bike off 50 calories.
Gak did this while his teammates practiced. He would enter the gym after a workout utterly drenched and take his seat to watch.
"I never want to go through anything like that again," he said.
Maybe not, but on Thursday, Gak weighed 235 pounds, down 32 from his max in January when it was chore just to get up and down the floor when allowed to take part in the team's full-court running and shooting drills.
"At 30 pounds less, I will fly like a kite through them this year," Gak vowed. When on the floor, Gorjok Gak's size and length provide a presence in the post.
The current Florida roster has just two post players — Bassett and Stokes — who got minutes last season, and their combined productivity was 5.4 points and 3.3 rebounds. The Gators, with one open scholarship spot, remain in the market for a graduate-transfer big man, but whether or not one materializes a 100-percent healthy Gak, given his size, length and ability to alter shots, would only be a plus.
Remember the UVA game.
"That was just a little glimpse," Gak said. "I feel like I have a lot more to show."
He just wants a chance to actually show it.
"I think people have probably forgotten about the player he was, and how big and long he is, since he really hasn't been healthy in two years," Nichols said. "With his ability to pass it and dribble-handoff and get our guards going downhill from the high post, he could give us something we've not had around here."
The Gators are banking on Gak and those traits being in the gym everyday this season. Better yet, on the floor every game.
