Florida Gators Jump Into Top 5 in Latest AP Poll

Gainesville, Fla. – The Florida Gators moved up three spots into the top five of the latest AP Top 25 on Monday. This move up in the rankings comes after two big in-conference wins, including one over the top team in the country.
After losing to the Kentucky Wildcats in Lexington two weekends ago, the Gators dropped two spots to No. 8.
Luckily, with how strong the SEC has been, they were given the chance to rebound from this loss with another big-time game against the former No. 1 team in the country, the Tennessee Volunteers, in their home arena last Tuesday.
Florida surprised many by absolutely dismantling Tennessee, winning by 30 points. This margin of victory would result in the largest victory over a No. 1-ranked team in the NCAA since 1968.
Additionally, this would be the Gators first regular season win over an AP No. 1-ranked team in program history.
However, it didn’t sound like the Gators were too caught up in the emotions of facing the No. 1 team.
“It's hard to say when you host the No. 1 team in the country that you expect to win, but I think our program did, you know, going into this game tonight,” Gators head coach Todd Golden said after the game about the significance of Florida’s first-ever win at home vs. a No. 1-ranked team. “I thought we had really good mentality, had a good shoot-around today, and our guys, they were just ready for it.”
Ready for it, they were.
The Gators held their opponents in check in this game, as the Volunteers made just 12 total shots in 40 min of game time. They also only knocked down 13.8 percent (4-for-29) of their three-pointers.
Then, following this victory, Florida was tasked with traveling to Fayetteville, AR., to go head-to-head against new Arkansas head coach John Calipari and his Razorbacks.
And, while they could’ve let the highs of taking down then-ranked No. 1 Tennessee impact their efforts in this one, Florida was able to contain Arkansas 71-63.
This win over Arkansas now has Florida sitting at 2-1 in the SEC, which is considerably good when the only three SEC teams they’ve played are Tennessee, Kentucky and Arkansas. Furthermore, two of these three were on the road.
Fortunately for the Gators, things now get slightly easier over the next four games.
Up next is the Missouri Tigers on Tuesday at Exactech Arena. Then, they’ll host the Texas Longhorns before traveling to South Carolina after that. And finally, they cap off this rather light four game stretch with the Georgia Bulldogs at home.
Should they get through this unscathed, then there’s a chance they could soar up to the No. 1 spot in the country and SEC if results go their way.