{"id":134577,"date":"2026-01-28T06:10:31","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T06:10:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/134577\/"},"modified":"2026-01-28T06:10:31","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T06:10:31","slug":"gators-seek-bounce-back-win-amid-alex-condons-struggles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/134577\/","title":{"rendered":"Gators seek bounce-back win amid Alex Condon’s struggles"},"content":{"rendered":"

GAINESVILLE \u2014 Coach Todd Golden<\/a> isn\u2019t convinced Auburn provided a blueprint to beat Florida.<\/p>\n

The Gators beat themselves<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Florida\u2019s lackluster first-half effort for a sold-out home crowd was surprising. The Gators\u2019 shooting struggles were not. If the combination is repeated, beginning Wednesday night at South Carolina, Golden will be disappointed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re really consistent in our approach,\u201d he said Tuesday. \u201cOur guys are ready to go, and they compete the right way. We\u2019re not gonna change up too much of what we do. We just can\u2019t let it happen again.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf it happens again, then I think it\u2019ll be something that we have to kind of pinpoint and try to address if there\u2019s one specific thing that we can do differently.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Saturday at the O\u2019Connell Center, Auburn took the fight to Florida (14-6, 5-2 SEC), beating the nation\u2019s top rebounding team 19-13 on the boards to build a 43-28 halftime lead before holding on for a 76-67 win.<\/p>\n

A reality check accompanied the unceremonious end of a five-game winning streak at the O\u2019Dome, where the Gators had won 16 straight.<\/p>\n

Given their 3-point shooting woes, the Gators have to capitalize on advantages elsewhere. Florida\u2019s dominance under the basket and small forward Tommy Haugh\u2019s All-America-caliber play had been enough, and could be again at struggling South Carolina (11-9, 2-5).<\/p>\n

UF\u2019s plus-15.4 rebounding margin leads the nation. The high-flying 6-foot-9, 215-pound Haugh, who averages 17.4 points and 6.7 rebounds, is among four SEC players in the top 15 in both categories.<\/p>\n

Yet, Florida shoots just 28.5% from 3-point range, better than just six of 361 teams nationally and worst in the power conferences.<\/p>\n

Preseason All-America Alex Condon\u2019s confidence dip was evident during his one-point, four-turnover performance against Auburn. The Tigers left open the 6-foot-11, 230-pound junior at the 3-point line, where he missed both his attempts to leave him 6-of-42 on the season (14.3%).<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen somebody\u2019s not guarding you, I think it can kind of messes you a little bit,\u201d Golden said. \u201cI need to do a better job is giving him the right plan when that happens. I could be wrong. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s a good formula for guarding a really good player after you have a little bit of time to prepare for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Condon spent the offseason pushing to improve his outside shooting to raise his NBA draft stock. If he can approach his 32.8% clip from last season, the Gators could be hard to beat.<\/p>\n

At the same time, 20 games into the season, the Gators have established a track record and an identity, while revealing their warts. Golden still remains confident the nation\u2019s preseason No. 3 has the talent and time to reach its goals.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think this team\u2019s in a good spot,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s obviously a game or two that we wish we would have won. We\u2019ve proven over the last three or four weeks that we can win a lot of games against really good teams \u2013 winning five straight Quad 1 games in a row. This team still has a high ceiling, and and we\u2019ve got to make sure we continue to have a high floor.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis team is still capable of everything that we wanted to do at the beginning of the year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Edgar Thompson can be reached at egthompson@orlandosentinel.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GAINESVILLE \u2014 Coach Todd Golden isn\u2019t convinced Auburn provided a blueprint to beat Florida. The Gators beat themselves.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":134578,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[111,28,2530,2496,114,139,141,140,110],"class_list":{"0":"post-134577","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-orlando","8":"tag-college-sports","9":"tag-florida","10":"tag-florida-gators","11":"tag-gainesville","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-orlando","14":"tag-orlando-headlines","15":"tag-orlando-news","16":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134577","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=134577"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134577\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/134578"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}