TAMPA

For its first-round bout, No. 1 Florida will tip off with No. 16-seeded Prairie View A&M (19-17) at 9:25 p.m. on Friday. In Tampa. That’s Eastern time, which makes this an interesting draw for a No. 1-seed, especially one already lightly shaking.

As can be the case with the NCAA Tournament, tip times aren’t gospel. Tampa’s Benchmark International Arena will host four consecutive games Friday. There’s a possibility Florida’s first bout won’t even begin until after 10, which could mean the game could still be live after midnight.

No player on Florida’s roster said they’d ever played a game that late.

“It’ll definitely be a little different,” Florida guard Xaivian Lee said Thursday. “Like, everything will be the same, but it’ll just make our schedule be later.”

To his point, the Gators (26-7) didn’t seem all that concerned about the timing. Twas are the small challenges of a championship run, and 16 teams play first-round games that start after 9, anyway. Half of those contests are in the Eastern timezone, as well.

But it does change some of Florida’s daily schedule. The players eat exactly four hours before every game — an intentional decision by Florida’s nutritionists, though not one they would like to outline.

“Government secrets,” Gators director of basketball operations Jordan Jacobson said.

Right.

They also have specific curfews the night before games and meeting times the morning of them, geared toward ensuring their bodies are in their peak performance cycles — another piece the Gators’ trainers have limited interest in explaining.

Each aspect of the timeline, however, shifts backward this weekend, something the team has had to implement throughout the week leading into Friday. If the Gators win, the challenge then becomes shifting the schedule forward, with the possibility of a noon game on Sunday.

“We have to consider it,” Jacobson said during the SEC Tournament, when the Gators played two games on consecutive days. “Obviously, these guys are all capable and can perform whenever, but games in short succession can throw our schedule around.”

It isn’t a concern for all.

“Doesn’t change a thing,” center Rueben Chinyelu said Thursday.

Especially with AAU circuits rapidly growing, where some play as many as three or four games in a day, most college players are accustomed to abrupt turnarounds and shifting tip times. The Gators, specifically, are more prepped than others. Florida played 18 games this year that started after 7 p.m., more than any other team at the Tampa regional. Their SEC-winning beatdown of Arkansas two weeks ago was even at 8:30 p.m. ET, so this isn’t abnormal territory.

“We’re just consistent,” Chineylu said. “We’ll do everything the same. … It isn’t something we’ve ever thought about.”

Maybe that’s because Florida has greater things to spend its time stressing about. The Gators enter this weekend off a surprise loss in the SEC Tournament quarterfinals to Vanderbilt. Currently, Florida has the worst odds to win the national championship among the No. 1 seeds and is only barely favored over No. 2-seeded Houston within its own region, according to DraftKings Sportsbook. The majority of media outlets even list Houston, seeking retribution for its title loss to Florida, as their pick out of the South.

“We just do a good job of using it as motivation,” Florida forward Alex Condon said. “We’ve just got to take one game at a time.”

That’ll start with some later alarms Friday morning, and ideally, a happy 1 a.m. bus ride Saturday morning.