Lander's Layup Line: A True Threat in the SEC

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Coming into the season, the No. 13 Florida Gators were the unknown or labeled as the wildcard. However, we're nine games into the season, and it’s pretty obvious what they are now and that’s a real threat for the SEC and the big one at the end of the year.

This team showed everyone once again why they deserve to be in the top 15 and why they probably should be top 10 with a brutal smackdown of the Virginia Cavaliers on Wednesday. Maybe they had some hurt feelings of how the morning transpired on Early Signing Day for the football program and wanted to unleash some anger for Billy Napier and his guys.

Or maybe it was the fact that they lost to this team at the beginning of last year.

“Definitely a get-back game,” Alex Condon said.

“Definitely some satisfaction in there,” Walter Clayton Jr. added while laughing.

Whatever it was, it got the job done, and the wildest thing about this win is the Gators are now 9-0 on the season for the first time in nearly two decades. Florida's last 9-0 start came in the 2005-06, when Billy Donovan led Florida to the first of back-to-back national championships.

They do have a long way to go to match that first championship-winning team, though. Actually, let me be more clear, it’s not just a long way to go, but rather a gigantic, humongous, never-ending way to go until they catch up to them as they started the season 17-0.

Still though, this start is as impressive as it gets. It doesn’t matter that they haven’t been given a similar test to teams like Duke or Auburn. Starting 9-0 is still starting 9-0. If it was so easy, then how come this is only the third time in program history it’s happened?

What makes this team so dangerous is the plethora of options they have that can get you a basket at any time and in different ways. To start, they have a potential All-American in Walter Clayton Jr. Then, they have Alijah Martin, Condon, Denzel Aberdeen and you can even throw Thomas Haugh in there, who can find a way to get the ball through the net. That’s depth in numbers.

And when you’re this deep, it makes everything so much easier. You can plug and play anyone on the roster because the trust is already there for any player you have on that bench.

The other thing that makes this team a threat for the SEC and March Madness is their ability to flip a switch. In the first half against the Cavaliers, the Gators shot around 43 percent from the field and 33.3 percent from 3-point range. As for the second, the offense hit the afterburner and took off, making 64 percent of their shots and shot 50 percent from behind the arc.

Additionally, when the offense is able to combine this type of effort along with playing physical, hard-nosed defense, it leads to big spurts happening, which head coach Todd Golden spoke about after his win in the SEC/ACC Challenge.

“One of the really good qualities of our team is our spurt-ability, in our ability to go on big runs,” Golden said. “I think it speaks to the efficiency of the way we play offense and the way we’ve been better on the defensive end.”

If this team could just post a full, complete 40-minute game, there’s no saying who they couldn’t beat this season. The Gators will get their first test, though, real soon. They have Arizona State on the 14th and then North Carolina on the 17th.

I shouldn’t get carried away just yet with these two tests coming up for the Gators, but isn't it fun believing like this?

I also know they say it’s the hope that kills you, but it’s hard to say if that’s true or not with how I am feeling right now.