It might’ve taken more than five minutes of action for the Arizona freshman to get his first bucket, but it didn’t take Koa Peat long to make his presence felt in a 93-87 win over the defending national champion Florida in the 2025-26 season opener on Monday night.
love this from koa peat
really patient and kept it simple to set up an easy jumper pic.twitter.com/glYZHenPpQ
— Paige (@paigeotto_) November 4, 2025
The 6-foot-8 product out of Gilbert Perry High School lit up the stats sheet with 30 points on 11-of-18 shooting, five assists and seven rebounds. His play was also clean on the defensive end of the floor with only one foul.
The Chandler native didn’t shoot a single 3, as the Wildcats only got up four before halftime (five total). The two made 3s came from an unlikely source in German freshman Ivan Kharchenkov, who had 12 points on 3-of-9 shooting and 10 rebounds (three offensive).
Peat told reporters postgame two of his team’s bigs, Motiejus Krivas and Tobe Awaka, helped prepare him to show out during his college debut.
“I think it’s just having big Mo and Tobe guarding me at practice every day,” Peat said. “Those guys I think are some of the best forwards, centers in the country. They don’t really get noticed as much as this other guys, but I think they showed it tonight, I think we showed it tonight that we’re a really good front court.
“I’m just thankful for my teammates.”
Peat became the first player in Big 12 history to put up at least 30 points and five assists in their career debut, according to ESPN Research.
The rest of coach Tommy Lloyd’s squad was being rotated on the regular, as is often the case during the first game of a new season, but others were still making use of their abbreviated moments on the court against the Gators.
Senior Jaden Bradley stole a bit of Peat’s thunder with 27 points (9-for-14 shooting) — 15 in the second half– five assists and three rebounds. He scored all 10 of Arizona’s points late in the action to push the Wildcats to their biggest lead (85-76) with 2:20 left.
Junior center Krivas, in his first official contest since a leg injury last December, made Arizona’s first two baskets and settled for six points on 2 of 5 from the field and eight rebounds.
Three of Florida’s starting five were returning players from its NCAA Tournament win over Houston — Chinyelu, Thomas Haugh and Alex Condon.
Haugh, who had 27 points (7-of-13 shooting) and was 12 of 14 from the free-throw line, cut the Arizona lead, which was as high as nine, to three after grabbing his own miss and slamming home a dunk with 29 seconds left.
Peat put Florida returning center Rueben Chinyelu on skates and proceeded to do his best Michael Jordan impression, as he knocked down a jumper just inside the free-throw line.
Koa Peat catching up his defender. 🤯 #BearDown pic.twitter.com/JDpKXJQksC
— Arizona Basketball (@ArizonaMBB) November 4, 2025
The highlight reel was far from done, as Peat added a nifty steal for a fast-break layup and a ferocious dunk after an assist from Anthony Dell’Orso to regain the lead 72-70 with under seven minutes in regulation.
KOA PEAT IS DISGUSTING 🤯
— College Basketball Report (@CBKReport) November 4, 2025
Peat paced all scorers in the game, had two turnovers and sunk eight of 12 free-throw attempts, nailing several to ice the final outcome.
TNT commentators expressed how impressed they were at the break, even making comparisons to Duke freshman Cameron Boozer, son of former NBA player Carlos Boozer.
“He reminds me an awful lot of the kid from Duke, Boozer.” 😮@coachbrucepearl, @JalenRose and @jamalmashburn were impressed by Koa Peat’s productive first half 🗣️ pic.twitter.com/yfs23NlwrW
— TNT Sports U.S. (@TNTSportsUS) November 4, 2025
He was listed by ESPN as one of the top 100 players to watch entering the season alongside Bradley.
With the win, Lloyd’s record at T-Mobile Arena as Arizona’s head coach improved to 10-2.
