GAINESVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Rueben Chinyelu had 14 points and a career-high 21 rebounds, Alex Condon recorded 20 points and 11 boards for his third double-double of the season, and No. 10 Florida overwhelmed Merrimack from the opening tip in an 80-45 victory Friday night.<\/p>\n
The world\u2019s tallest teenager, 7-foot-9 Olivier Rioux<\/a>, got the loudest ovation of the night when he checked in with 2:26 to play. The tallest player in college basketball history got fouled the first time he touched the ball and hit a free throw. He also got his first rebound.<\/p>\n It was final November tune-up for the defending national champion Gators (4-1), who next play a Thanksgiving tournament on the West Coast and then have measuring-stick games against No. 5 Duke and third-ranked UConn.<\/p>\n Florida had four players score in double figures, including Thomas Haugh (13) and Boogie Fland (10). <\/p>\n The Gators dominated down low, as expected. They finished with 36 points in the paint and a 53-25 rebounding advantage.<\/p>\n Florida players, coaches and support staff received their diamond-laced, oversized championship rings earlier in the week, and fans in attendance were given equally gaudy but far less expensive replica rings.<\/p>\n The Gators put on a show in front of a packed O\u2019Connell Center, scoring the first 11 points and later using a 19-0 run to take a 32-4 lead with eight minutes to play in the first half.<\/p>\n Merrimack (2-4) battled back but was no match for Florida\u2019s size, speed and athleticism.<\/p>\n Kevair Kennedy led the Warriors with 14 points. Leading scorer Ernest Shelton, coming off a career-high 33 points and a school record-tying nine 3-pointers, missed his first six shots and fouled out with three points.<\/p>\n Florida played without backup center Micah Handlogten, who was held out as a precaution after sustaining a concussion against Miami last week.<\/p>\n Up next<\/p>\n Merrimack plays at Penn next Friday.<\/p>\n Florida plays TCU on Thursday in San Diego, part of the Rady Children\u2019s Invitational.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here<\/a> and here<\/a> (AP News mobile app). AP college basketball: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/ap-top-25-college-basketball-poll<\/a> and https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/college-basketball<\/a><\/p>\n Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GAINESVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Rueben Chinyelu had 14 points and a career-high 21 rebounds, Alex Condon recorded 20 points…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":56535,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[3107,25398,28,30,29,25387,110,3115],"class_list":{"0":"post-56534","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-alex-condon","9":"tag-ernest-shelton","10":"tag-florida","11":"tag-florida-headlines","12":"tag-florida-news","13":"tag-olivier-rioux","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-thomas-haugh"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56534","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=56534"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56534\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56534"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56534"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56534"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}