Florida Gators

No. 24 Florida vs. Vanderbilt

 
* When: Saturday, 1 p.m. (ET)
* Where: Exactech Arena/O'Connell Center / Gainesville, Fla.
* Records: Florida (18-8, 8-5) / Vanderbilt (7-19, 2-11)
* TV: SEC Network (Mark Morgan and Mark Wise)
* Radio: Gator Sports Network from LEARFIELD
              (with Sean Kelley and Lee Humphrey) / Stations list
* Ticket info

---

Projected Starters

Florida	Position	Height / Weight	Class	Statistics
Tyrese Samuel	F	6-10 / 239	Graduate	12.9 pts / 7.9 reb
Micah Handlogten	C	7-1 / 236	Sophomore	6.5 pts / 7.6 reb
Will Richard	G	6-4 / 206	Junior	11.3 pts / 3.8 reb
Walter Clayton Jr.	G	6-2 / 195	Junior	16.8 pts / 3.8 reb
Zyon Pullin	G	6-4 / 206	Graduate	15.6 pts / 4.0 reb / 4.9 ast

Vanderbilt	Position	Height / Weight	Class	Statistics
Evan Taylor	F	6-6 / 205	Senior	8.7 pts / 3.8 reb
Ven-Allen Lubin	F	6-8 / 230	Sophomore	10.9 pts / 5.8 reb
Isaiah West	G	6-2 / 190	Freshman	3.2 pts / 1.2 reb
Tyrin Lawrence	G	6-4 / 200	Senior	13.0 pts / 5.0 reb
Ezra Manjon	G	6-0 / 170	Senior	14.0 pts / 3.0 reb / 3.7 ast

The Breakdown

Setup / Series / Last Meeting

No. 24 Florida and Vanderbilt meet in a Southeastern Conference game between one team playing like one of the best in the league and another sitting next to last in the standings. ... The Gators, who will be playing their first home game as a ranked team since December 2021, have won seven of the previous nine games, but are coming off a 98-93 overtime loss at first-place and 13th-ranked Alabama. The Commodores, two games ahead of winless Missouri at the bottom of the SEC standings, started the conference season with seven losses, then defeated Missouri at home and 10 days later beat Texas A&M at the buzzer. Since that game, Vandy was beaten by 35 at Tennessee and lost 76-64 Wednesday at home against Georgia, which had dropped six in a row. ... The all-time series between Florida and Vanderbilt is tied 73-73 after the Commodores swept both meetings last season. Vandy beat UF 88-80 on Feb. 11, 2023 in Gainesville, then two weeks later trounced the Gators 88-72 at Nashville, Tenn. In the latter, 7-foot center Liam Robbins, the eventual 2023 SEC Defensive Player of the Year, tallied 19 points, nine rebounds and five blocked shots to compliment a lethal perimeter game that put four more of his teammates in double figures, dropped 10 3-pointers and shot 52 percent for the game. The loss was UF's third straight after losing 6-11 forward and three-time All-SEC forward Colin Castleton to a season-ending broken hand and dropped the Gators below .500 for the first time during the season. UF was led by a game-high 20 points from freshman guard Riley Kugel, who posted his sixth consecutive double-figure scoring game. Fifth-year point guard Kyle Lofton added 15 points.
 

Tale of the Tape

Florida	Statistics	Vanderbilt
85.7	Scoring	66.2
.453	Field-goal percentage	.392
.334	3-point percentage	.288
77.7	Scoring defense	74.3
.436	Field-goal percentage defense	.454
.328	3-point percentage defense	.380
27th	KenPom.com overall ranking	208th
11th	KenPom.com offensive efficiency	209th
90th	KenPom.com defensive efficiency	221st
38th	KenPom.com adjusted tempo	294th
30th	NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET) ranking	230th
24th	Overall strength of schedule ranking	254th

Team Snapshots

The Gators

They came oh-so-close to another big road win. The Gators led by 10 midway through the second half at Alabama and by nine with six minutes to go when the Crimson Tide mounted their

comeback fueled by a pair of 3-pointers during a 10-0 stretch. UF had a three-point lead in regulation with 1:40 to go and two-point edge inside a minute before the Tide forced overtime. In the extra period, Bama scored the first seven points, forcing Florida into catch-up mode. The Gators twice had possessions to either take the lead or tie. Those possessions ended with a turnover and missed 3. ... UF remains one of the most efficient offenses in the country (behind only Alabama and Kentucky in the SEC). The Gators are up to No. 2 nationally in offensive rebounding percentage, but had their poorest showing on the glass of the season at Tuscaloosa, where they were minus-10 overall and minus-4 on the offensive end. ... Guard Walter Clayton Jr. scored a game-high 27 points, but was just nine of 24 from the floor and 4-for-16 from the 3-point line. The game marked Clayton's 10th this season of at least 20 points, equaling the most in the program since Kenny Boynton's 13 during the 2011-12 campaign. ... Point guard Zyon Pullin had another stat-stuffing line, finishing with 17 points, four rebounds, six assists and just two turnovers. Pullin and Clayton both played over 40 minutes, with guard Will Richard, who had 17 points and went 3-for-8 from distance, on the floor for another nearly 40. ... Pullin has hit double-figure scoring in all 23 of his games as a Gator. ... Center Micah Handlogten managed just five points on two field-goal attempts, but the 7-footer was a factor in the post. Handlogten gave up some baskets in one-on-one situations, but he also grabbed 13 rebounds, including nine on the offensive end, to go with three blocked shots. Handlogten ranks second nationally in offensive rebounding percentage in gathering 19.2 percent of his team's misses. ... Forward Tyrese Samuel, who's shooting 59 percent from the 2-point area on the season, had 14 points and eight rebounds, with a couple big late-game baskets that put the Gators in position in regulation. ... Backup freshman forward Alex Condon (7.6 ppg, 6.5 rpg) went 4-for-5 from the floor, but was limited to just four rebounds and canceled out his three assists and with turnovers. Condon has a 3-pointer in the second half of each of the last two games and is 4-for-10 from deep in SEC play. ... Reserve forward Thomas Haugh (3.7 ppg, 3.7 rpg), who had a career-best 17 points and seven boards in the win at Georgia four days earlier, scored just two points and failed to get a rebound for the first time in the last six games over his 13 minutes. ... Backup sophomore guard Riley Kugel (10.1 ppg, 3.7 rpg), who missed a practice heading into the Bama game, was on the floor for just 2:31 of the first half (no points, one rebound, one turnover) and did not play in the second half or overtime.  
 

The Commodores

It's their fifth season under former NBA star Jerry Stackhouse -- and quite possibly the last. After two losing seasons to start his Vandy stint, the program appeared to be moving forward when

Stackhouse guided the Commodores to back-to-back winning seasons, including last year's 22-15 campaign that included an 11-7 mark in the SEC and run to the NIT quarterfinals for the second straight season. Vandy lost Robbins to the pros and two more of their best players, Jordan Wright (LSU) and Myles Stute (South Carolina) to a couple conference rivals. The season opened with a home loss to Presbyterian and has been basically a downer since. Stackhouse has always been admired for his sophisticated NBA-like offenses, but the '23-24 Commodores just don't have the talent they had in the past. Vandy currently ranks next to last in the SEC in virtually every meaningful offensive category. Making matters worse, the Commodores also rate last or next to last in every meaningful defensive category, including guarding the 2-point (53.9 percent) and 3-point (37.5) areas. ... Vandy's tallest starter is 6-8, so Florida should have a significant advantage inside. ... Point guard Ezra Manjon, in his second season since coming from California-Davis, was the one who put the buzzer-beating dagger to A&M two weeks ago. He's at 43.5 percent from the floor and has made just 12 3s this season at 30.8 percent. Manjon is an attacker who can draw fouls (nearly 84 percent on 116 attempts). ... Guard Tyrin Lawrence entered the transfer portal last spring, but opted to return to Vandy. He's a four-year Commodore who is not shooting great (39 overall, 26 from deep), but like Manjon he's a foul-drawer with a team-high 117 trips to the line (71.8 percent). ... Forward Ven-Allen Lubin was a standout at Orlando Christian Prep and originally signed with Notre Dame, where he played in all but four games last season before transferring to Vandy. He had eight games in double figures for the Irish, with one double-double. As the Commodores' lone starting "big," he's at 49 percent on the season and had a career-high 25 points in the upset of A&M. Lubin is not much of a 3-point threat (9 of 29), but gets after it on the glass. His 43 offensive rebounds is going on approaching twice as many as the next-best Dore. ... Guard Evan Taylor has 43 makes from deep on 129 attempts, both team highs. The Lehigh transfer scored 25 earlier this season against Arizona State and 20 a couple weeks ago against Kentucky. ...  Grad transfer Tasos Kamateros had just shy of 1,000 points and 500 rebounds in four seasons at South Dakota. He comes off the bench, but his 26 makes from 3 rate second on the team. 
 

Numbers of Note

* 4.04 — Pullin's assist-to-turnover ratio, which ranks No. 2 nationally behind only College of Charleston's CJ Fulton (4.50). Pullin has 113 assists and just 28 turnovers on the season. 

* 5 — Consecutive weekend sellouts at the O'Dome for the Gators. That hasn't happened here since 2014. 

* 77.1 — Percentage Vandy opponents have shot from the free-throw line this season, placing the Commodores 359th (or fourth from the bottom in the country) in the so-called "free throw defense" category. Only Creighton (77.5), Detroit Mercy (78.0) and Northern Iowa (78.0) rank lower.   

* 100.00 — Combined free-throw shooting percentage the last two games of Florida's three starting guards -- Clayton, Pullin and Richard -- based on their collective 28-for-28 from the line on the road (17 of 17 at Georgia last weekend; 11 of 11 at Bama).

* 16,409 — Points scored by Stackhouse during his 18 NBA seasons with eight different teams (Philadelphia, Detroit, Washington, Dallas, Milwaukee, Miami, Atlanta and Brooklyn).   
 

Bottom Line

Need a straight-up and solid bounce-back performance in front a packed house. That's how a team with aspirations of a promising postseason should respond to a hard-fought road defeat.