Myreon Jones (0) has worked his 3-point percentage up to XX.X in SEC play.
Jones Kept Confidence, Kept Routine
Saturday, February 12, 2022 | Men's Basketball, Chris Harry
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By: Chris Harry, Senior Writer
LEXINGTON, Ky. — Barely a minute into Florida's game Dec. 18 against South Florida, guard Myreon Jones was drifting the perimeter when forward Colin Castleton pitched a pass from the post. Routine stuff. Except for the way it landed.
Myreon Jones
As Jones caught the ball, he felt his left index finger get jammed. Or at least he thought. Jones has been playing basketball most of his life. Similar finger faux pauxs had happened countless times.
"I didn't think anything of it," Jones said.
But as the game went on, the finger began to swell. And swell. Athletic trainer Dave Werner wrapped it, but Jones still couldn't get a good feel for the ball and eventually took the bandage off. Jones went on to hit three of his 13 shots and just one of seven attempts from the 3-point line in the Gators' 66-55 defeat of the Bulls.
The next day X-rays revealed a fracture in the finger. A week or so later, Jones got COVID. Then he entered a phase of nine games when he shot just 31.3 percent from deep. He lost his starting job.
Good times.
They've been better of late. Much, much better. On Wednesday, Jones drained a career-high seven 3s and scored 23 points in Florida's win over Georgia. That game followed an eight-point outing when he dropped two of four from distance, including one late in regulation and one biggie in overtime to help beat Ole Miss. Three days before, Jones nailed his first five tries from 3 in an eventual one-point road win at Missouri. He's 14 of 23 from the arc the previous three games, which converts to 60.9 percent.
Myreon Jones lets fly one of his rainbow-arching 3-pointers, of which he made five, in a win last week at Missouri.
"We knew, for Myreon, it was just a matter of time," fifth-year senior forward Anthony Duruji said. "He's our best shooter."
It took a while, but the finger healed and the adjustments Jones had to make in executing his shot have given way to normalcy. That's not to say his deadly shooting ways will proceed at his recent torrid pace, but his run of late is an encouraging sign that the player who hit 3s at a career 37.5 percent for three seasons at Penn State is inching back in that direction. He's now at 39.1 percent in Southeastern Conference play and, along with his teammates, would love to continue on that current trajectory as the Gators (16-8, 6-5), winners of four straight, open a brutal stretch of league play with Saturday's annual trip to face fifth-ranked Kentucky (20-4, 9-2) at sold-out Rupp Arena.
[Read senior writer Chris Harry's "Pregame Stuff" setup here]
"When you're growing up playing basketball, you see Rupp Arena on TV and you see the [Phog Allen] Fieldhouse at Kansas, and you dream about playing in places like that," said Jones, the 6-foot-3, 175-pounder from Birmingham, Ala. "To be able to go there this late in my career is really cool, especially with a game where there's a lot on the line."
It's not like Jones hasn't played in elite environments before. As a Nittany Lion, he loved his trips to Purdue and Indiana, Michigan and even Rutgers. The Breslin Center at Michigan State, he said, might have been the wildest.
Rupp is Breslin, plus another 10,000 fans.
Beating the Wildcats is always hard. Beating them at Rupp is a monumental task. UF has won just 11 games in 64 tries at Lexington, and this might be the best team — armed with 2022 NCAA Player of the Year candidate Oscar Tsweibwe in the post — that UK coach John Calipari has had since the 2014-15 team that went unbeaten, with 38 straight, before losing in the Final Four.
The Gators certainly stand a better chance with the best version of Jones, who last spring was a highly sought transfer-portal entry who narrowed his choices to UF, Arkansas, LSU and Ole Miss. He use his uniquely high-arching jumper to score 834 points over his first three seasons with Penn State and combined to average14.5 points and shoot 39.7 percent from the arc his sophomore and junior seasons on his way to honorable mention Big Ten recognition.
As a sophomore at Penn State, Myreon Jones (0) hit a career-high 40.3 percent of his 3s (65 of 139).
Players don't all of a sudden just lose that kind of marksmanship. Maybe for a game or two, but not for a season.
"When his shots weren't falling, he never strayed from his routine," UF assistant coach Akeem Miskdeen said. "He stayed consistent and that's what you have to do."
Shooting-wise, Jones began his first season in Gainesville much like he left his last two in State College, Pa. Through the month of November, Jones was dropping 3s at 41.6 percent, as the Gators opened the season with six straight wins. Then the calendar flipped from November, starting with a road trip to Oklahoma, and things went south; for Jones and UF.
In the first four games of December, Jones was just 3-for-20 from deep, with Florida losing three of games. Then came the trip to Sunrise, Fla., and the game against USF in the Orange Bowl Classic. And the finger.
It was a difficult two months for Jones.
"I wouldn't say I ever hit a low point, but I wasn't having fun," he said. "There were moments when I was like, 'Dang, what am I doing wrong?' and others where I was like, 'Is it me?' I just wanted to get back to my old self."
He talked to his coaches, his teammates, his parents, his grandmother, his uncle, and even his former coaches at Penn State. They all told Jones what he already knew. They could tell from his body language he was in a tough place, and that, somehow, he had to maintain his confidence. It wasn't easy.
What never wavered for Jones, however, was his daily routine. He'd come to the gym each morning, hours before practice, and get an individual workout with an assistant coach, then do shooting drills with grad-transfer teammate Phlandrous Fleming Jr. After practice each day, he stuck around for around-the-arc shooting with walk-on teammate Jack May. He still does all these things daily.
"When it's not going right, the easy thing to do, what a lot of guys do, they don't stick to the routine," Miskdeen said. "He kept hearing the same language from everybody — stay the course — so that kept him confident. But you do eventually have to see some go in."
Those five at Mizzou definitely helped, so imagine what the seven against Georgia did to get Jones' mind right.
The healed finger factored in, also.
"I thought Myreon pretty much stayed in a decent place. He continued to live in the gym and really work. I don't know that he hits seven 3s [Saturday] — but I hope he hits eight," White said. "I think part of the reason he was in a little bit of a slump was that he was trying to morph into a new situation, new system, new offense, new defense, and we have played some high-level defenses this season. The injury was a factor, of course, but he never made excuses. I'm happy for him, proud of him, but he has a ways to go. Hopefully, he can finish strong."
When things got tough forMyreon Jones, his coaches, teammates, family and friends were there to pick him up.
Finishing the way he's playing right now would suffice, at least as far as his teammates are concerned. When he buried his first 3-ball against the Bulldogs, guard Brandon McKissic promised he'd keeping finding him. He hit another and point guard Tyree Appleby extolled him to "Get open! Keep shooting!" He got the same encouragement from Fleming. Then it was forward Colin Castleton, who was getting double- and triple-teamed in the post, promising to kick it out.
When Castleton did so this time, the pass landed softly (and safely) in Jones' hands. His shot did the rest.
