Column: Florida Lacks Leadership in Big Moments. Who Can Step Up?

Whether you're a fan of Mike White or not, Florida lacks leadership on the court in key moments. To save the 2019-20 season, someone will have to step up.

I’m a pretty avid basketball fan.

I first learned about the sport of basketball from my dad. Growing up in Miami, our basketball conversations usually revolved around the Miami Heat. Though the team today found its star in Jimmy Butler, it was lacking one in the years prior. Back then, the Heat would struggle in this mediocre “purgatory” with no real closer or finisher. 

We often used the term “fourth-quarter player” to refer to those guys who would rise to the occasion and take over in the clutch. Now that the Heat finally found one, they’re second in the East.

Good teams usually have one, great teams have multiple. The Gators (in this case, a "second-half player") have none.

That’s the root of their problem. They have no identity on offense, no leadership on the court and no player to take over down the stretch. Florida had no player score more than six points in the second half against Mississippi State on Tuesday, and a majority of those came from free throws. 

The Gators lack a commanding force that they can count on down the stretch. You’d think Andrew Nembhard and Keyontae Johnson would be those guys, but they haven’t consistently proven they’re capable of such a label. And while the second half offense continues to struggle, the defense has been even worse.

White: "They had their way with us offensively in the second half in every way imaginable."

— Victor Prieto (@victorprieto_11) January 29, 2020

The Bulldogs just looked like they wanted it more Tuesday night and won because of it. 

Both coach Mike White and Scottie Lewis spoke of the team’s lack of effort to open the second half profoundly after the game. They both cited it as a problem and both said it needed to be fixed, but neither gave an answer for why they’re so slow out of the gate. 

And this isn’t the first time either.

The same happened in the Gators’ embarrassing 91-75 loss to Missouri, where the Tigers converted on more than 60 percent of their second-half shots to shock Florida in Columbia, Missouri. This lack of effort, again, starts with leadership.

Mike White: "We don't play extremely hard right now."

— Victor Prieto (@victorprieto_11) January 29, 2020

Now, this isn’t the part where we talk about how White deserves to be fired. He doesn’t. I can understand those fans calling for his head, but I don’t think there’s any reason yet. This is his team. He recruited and brought these players in, and he has a little more than a month to make them a cohesive unit. 

He’s going to need help, though.

Which player that’ll be is to be determined, or maybe it’s no player at all. But if Florida is to take that next step to where the media, players, and fans expected the Gators to be before the season started, someone will need to take that next step within the team. Someone will need to become that “second-half player”.

Florida has its easiest stretch of games in the coming weeks to steer the train back on track. But if the Gators continue to sputter, even through this stretch of Vanderbilt, Georgia, Ole Miss, and Texas A&M, then Florida’s derailing season is sure to end in a flaming trainwreck.