Florida Gators

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — After a recent practice, Florida basketball's two prized freshmen stopped for a brief courtside chat. Scottie Lewis and Tre Mann recalled when they first became aware of one another. They talked about five-star hype, touched on both individual and team expectations, as well as the need for humility and confidence in their first season as collegiate players. 

They also talked about winning championships. 

"That's why we came here," Mann said.
 
 

Lewis did a deeper dive, referencing both he and Mann, the program's first freshmen in six years with McDonald's All-America pedigree, but also tossed praise at teammates Andrew Nembhard, Noah Locke and Keyontae Johnson — the sophomore who that started a combined 82 games as freshmen last season — as well as center/forward Kerry Blackshear Jr., the standout grad-transfer from Virginia Tech whose addition in June turned the 2019-20 Gators into a likely preseason top-10 team. 

"We're going to be a very hard team to guard, with how fast we are, how athletic we are and with our ability to score the ball at all three levels," said Lewis, describing a team very different from the one that was 344th in Division I (out of 353) in pace-of-play last season. "We have extreme athletes all over the place. The way we've flipped the switch, flipped the script, from what it was to what it is now, I think I speak for a lot of people when I say it's a very exciting time here. We're extremely hungry for the season to start." 

Yes, Lewis most definitely was speaking for a lot of people, as in Gator Nation, which has not been treated to McDonald's alums since 2013-14 when center Chris Walker and point guard Kasey Hill arrived. Those two were role players on a team led by four seniors that won the Southeastern Conference and went to a Final Four. Walker was gone after two years (off to the G League), while Hill became a solid four-year player, regular starter and 1,000-point scorer who played in the Elite Eight as a senior. 

Neither Lewis nor Mann figure to be around that long, with Florida's thin track record of so-called "one-and-dones" (two in program history; none since Bradley Beal in 2012) is likely to be beefed up in 2020. 

So, enjoy the upcoming season, folks. 

"They've both been great. Super competitive and working hard every day," UF coach Mike White said of Lewis and Mann before turning his remarks to the overall. "We have a chance to be really good, but we all have to pull in the same direction, set aside individual aspirations and get over ourselves, to a certain extent, and sell out to the Gators being the most important thing." 

The enthusiasm for UF basketball has bubbled in the background for months, but will begin to boil Tuesday afternoon when the team hosts its annual preseason media day, during which Lewis and Mann figure to be popular subjects. The next phase of anticipation comes Friday with the first official preseason practice. By the time the Nov. 5 season opener against North Florida at Exactech Arena/O'Connell Center rolls around, the excitement should be at a fevered pitch. UF fans, though, might want keep their programs and rosters handy, what with nine newcomers (plus a 10th returnee) who did not play for the Gators last season. 

As for Lewis and Mann, they might be fresh-faced freshmen, but they're no strangers to one another.

Mann (on Lewis): "I just remember he was always on YouTube or Instagram." 

Lewis (on Mann): "I first knew about Tre my sophomore year of high school when we played in their tournament [at The Villages]."

And yet, the first time they were together, ironically, was in the UF basketball facility as rising ninth-graders at a team camp. They didn't know each other, didn't meet each other, but fate put them together four years later and, in turn, altered the national perception of White's program. 

"I've always said I don't get caught up in the rankings and hype and how others view our individual recruits and classes," said White, who until signing Lewis and Mann last November could claim one so-called "five-star" prospect (Nembhard) in his four previous recruiting cycles after replacing Billy Donovan in the spring of 2015. "I don't want to go there and say, 'Hey, we did it! We landed a couple McDonald's All-Americans!' I do think it becomes easier for the next potential high-profile player to consider us strongly. Ultimately, of course, they have to perform, and we feel very good that these guys will do that."

Rightfully so. 

The 6-foot-5, 185-pound Lewis, a consensus top-10 prospect, was an athletic, stat-stuffing, fast-twitch freak out of Hazlet, N.J., during his career at Ranney School, where he averaged 17.5 points, 6.3 rebounds, 3.6 assists, 2.7 steals and 1.5 blocks per game. His effort, unselfishness and versatility are rolled into an elite and explosive package — Lord, can he finish at the rim! — that also includes a character element that earned him the Sportsmanship Award at a Jam Fest event. His tremendous length and uncompromising motor should allow him to defend four positions, if need be, but his ideal position will be at small forward. His jumpshot needs some work, and Lewis works on it daily. Scoring, though, is just one of many things he will do to help the Gators this season. 



Mann, at 6-4 and 177 pounds, is an altogether different player, with rare gifts as an offensive threat and pure scorer the likes of which the Gators have not had in years. Mann averaged 23.6 points, 4.9 rebounds, 3.1 assists and 2.1 steals per game as a prep senior. He is equally adept at taking his man off the dribble and creating in the paint as he is pulling up from NBA range in transition or the half-court.



If they sound too good to be true, just remember: There are reasons the two were McDonald's All-Americans. The Gators, though, were recruiting the duo long before that. 

"We were on them both for four years," UF assistant Darris Nichols said. 

Nichols recalled the first time he saw Lewis. It was at a tournament in Suwannee, Ga., in 2015, the first year for White's Florida staff. Nichols was in a gym watching players from the class of '16 when a buddy coach told him about a team playing on another court on the other side of the complex that he had to see.

"How old are they?" Nichols asked. 

"They're 2019s," he was told. 

"Twenty-Nineteens?" Nichols shot back. "I don't even know if I'll be coaching in 2019."

But he went to watch anyway, and saw the New Jersey club team that featured Lewis and Bryan Antoine (now a freshman at Villanova). Nichols' jaw dropped. He called White into the gym and the head coach's reaction was the same. 

The recruiting process, basically, started that day. 

"Florida was one of the first offers I had," said Lewis, who eventually was being wooed by all the blood-blood programs and, in time, narrowed his final choices to UF and Kentucky. "Florida stuck with me throughout the whole process. Everything there seemed so family-oriented, and my mom and I took that into account when we sat down to make a final decision."

Along the way, Lewis was in constant communication with Mann, who he first played against in a tournament in Las Vegas and forged a relationship with through their mutual interest in the Gators. They got closer as signing day got closer, with texts and talks (some involving Nembhard and Johnson) got them revved about what they could help build together at UF. 

"That's all we talked about," Mann said. 

Added Lewis: "Kentucky does it all the time. Duke does it all time. This was about doing something different." 

For Mann, it seemed natural that he would gravitate toward UF, having grown up in Gainesville watching and rooting for the Gators, but there were other programs in the picture, including Tennessee. By then, Florida had a nice head start, having seen Mann's club team in action three years earlier when they watched him shoot in open gym as a ninth-grader. Mann may have been barely 6-feet-tall, and even more wiry at the time than he is now, but the ball was going in the basket with ridiculous consistency. 
 

Then came a couple tournament games.
 
"That's when I saw the spin-move, step-back," assistant Jordan Mincy said. "I was like, 'What?' "

A boatload of calls, texts, games and visits later, that spin-move, step-back (and others) looks even better in a UF practice jersey. 

On Tuesday, Mann and Lewis will done their Florida game jerseys for media photo shoots. In five weeks, they'll wear them for real, complete with sky-high expectations.

It's all about to come at them — all of these Gators — very fast. 

"We have an extremely young team, a young core, but it's a lot better than a lot of other young cores out there in college basketball," Lewis said. "We're learning and we're meshing, and I'm excited about what we're going to bring to the table; and not just me and Tre and the freshmen, but the guys that were here before. The coaches, they have a plan." 

These two highly acclaimed rookies are very much a part that plan, but not the only part. That's OK with both of them. 

"As long as we're winning, I'm good," Mann said. "When you have this many good players, sometimes you have to wait your turn. Basketball is a game of runs. Sometimes teams have runs, sometimes players have runs. You have to go with the flow. If you're winning, that's good, and if a player is producing and were winning, we're going to go with it."

To the next level. At least, that's the plan. 

"The goals are to hang more banners, win championships and become a program that's constantly being talked about," Lewis said. "That's all that matters."

It is. That's why they came here.