GAINESVILLE, Fla. — And then there were 13.
A pending attrition development in the Florida basketball program played itself out over the weekend
with reports that point guard
Andrew Nembhard, who started all 67 games during his two seasons with the Gators, intended to transfer. The news became official Sunday night when Nembhard posted his decision on social media.
Nembhard, the 6-foot-5, 193-pound playmaker from Ontario, Canada, averaged 9.5 points and 5.5 assists in helping lead UF to 39 victories and what would have been a second NCAA Tournament berth were it not for the Covid-19 pandemic that shut down college sports the day the team was scheduled to open play in the Southeastern Conference Tournament in March. For the second straight year, Nembhard entered the NBA draft's underclassmen process, but opted to pull out late last week amid the league and draft's uncertainty.
That Nembhard chose to transfer rather than return to Florida was not a complete surprise, given the Gators had signed Michigan transfer center Colin Castleton in April, a move that put the team at 14 scholarship players; or one over the limit of 13. Either Nembhard or guard
Tre Mann, who for now remains in the NBA underclassmen mix, was expected to leave.
It turned out to be the guy who'd brought the ball up and ran the team from the moment he arrived on campus in the summer of 2018.
In '19-20, Nembhard not only led the Gators in assists, but also in minutes at 33.2 and was second in field-goal attempts, just 10 shots behind scoring leader
Keyontae Johnson. He converted 44.1 percent from the floor, including 30.8 from the 3-point line, with his 104 attempts from the arc second only to sharp-shooting guard
Noah Locke. What Nembhard lacked in speed and athleticism, he made up for in size, length and savvy with regard to pace.
Nembhard's final UF numbers show 636 points and 367 assists, with his 2,214 minutes more than any UF player logged the last two seasons. That's a lot of production and leaves awfully big voids in scoring, facilitating and court time. How big?
According to
KenPom.com advanced metrics, Nembhard occupied the offense last season to the tune of 21.5 percent of possessions in '19-20, which ranked second on the team. When Nembhard was on the floor, everything started with him, eventually went through center/forward
Kerry Blackshear Jr. (team-high 25.5 percent usage rate), and oftentimes ended with Nembhard taking a shot. Those two players, in fact, accounted for a combined 32 percent of the team's field-goal attempts.
Sophomore point guard Andrew Nembhard averaged 11.0 points, 5.2 assists and 3.0 rebounds per game while playin a team-high 33.6 minutes per game during the 2019-20 season.
Now that both Nembhard
and Blackshear, the fifth-year graduate transfer, have moved on, the Gators figure to have a very different look about them when (and if) the 2020-21 season rolls around. Gone are the two players most prominently featured on the offensive end, but the team will return a trio of starters in Johnson, a first-team All-SEC selection after averaging 14.0 points and 7.0 rebounds, along with Locke, the league's top 3-pointer shooter in conference play at 48.4 percent, plus wing and defensive hawk
Scottie Lewis, who was playing his best basketball at the end of the season.
But what of the floor general spot, now that Nembhard has moved on?
The job, right now, looks to be in the hands of 6-1
Tyree Appleby, the fourth-year junior who sat out last season after transferring from Cleveland State, where as a sophomore during the '18-19 season he averaged 17.2 points, 3.7 rebounds, 5.6 assists and shot just shy of 39 percent from the 3-point line.
Appleby is a high-energy speedster who spent his sit-out year running the UF offense in practice. He'll square up against 5-11 sophomore
Ques Glover, another speedy type who in spot backup duty over 31 games as a freshman flashed some really nice moments in averaging 4.4 points per game, but struggled at times taking care of the ball (19 assists, 40 turnovers). Appleby, remember did not come to Florida until last July, with the Gators plucking the second-team All-Horizon League selection from the transfer portal as insurance because Coach
Mike White and his staff were operating under the assumption that Nembhard, who was playing with Team Canada in the FIBA World Championships at the time, would not be at UF beyond his sophomore season.
As it turned out, that scenario did not change. Only the circumstances.
And then there's Mann, the 6-4 former McDonald's All American and very likely the most offensively gifted player on the squad. His freshman year got waylaid early due to a concussion in the fourth game and it took a while for Mann (5.3 points per game, 35.6 percent from the floor) to regain his confidence. Late in the year, though, he was playing with an encouraging conviction. Mann is a combo guard by definition and has the skill set to play the point. He finished with 20 assists versus 32 turnovers last season, but did not get many reps on the ball.
Combo guard Tre Mann, the former McDonald's All American, averaged 5.2 points and 1.9 rebounds as a freshmen last season, but his game began to click in the final weeks.
Assuming Mann returns, the Gators definitely will be a more athletic team than last season, but perhaps of greater significance, a more versatile one. Whereas everything about the offense was initiated through Nembhard the last two seasons, Florida may opt to be more diversified — and uptempo — with its array of ball-handlers in Appleby, Glover and Mann, as well as Johnson and Lewis, plus whatever roles come from freshmen Samson Ruzhentsev and Niels Lane, both perimeter players. In addition to playing faster, the Gators may also be able to keep defenses guessing with multiple guys capable of bringing the ball up the floor.
That, in itself, would make for a different look.
With men's and women's basketball players scheduled to return to campus later this month, Mann's decision should come fairly soon, and thus further crystalize a picture that came a little more into focus the last few days.
