Florida basketball: When and where to watch the Gators’ season opener

Florida basketball is getting ready to debut their 2023-2024 squad tonight as we enter the second year of Todd Golden’s tenure.

This season comes with a little more excitement and optimism than years past for the Gators, as guys like Riley Kugel and Will Richard come back, and are joined by transfers Walter Clayton Jr., Tyrese Samuel, and others.

While it’s going to take a few weeks before we get to see the Gators consistently play against elite competition, these games at the beginning of the season will tell us a good bit about how we can expect to contribute regularly this season.

That all starts tonight when Florida takes on Loyola Maryland.

Florida basketball: Time to tip off the season

Here are the broadcast details for tonight’s opener:

Time: 8:00 PM

Channel: SEC Network + and ESPN +

With the pure volume of college basketball games today, combined with the low-level matchup, the Gators are related to the “plus” networks, which happens a lot in college basketball.

ESPN Analytics gives the Gators a 95.5% chance to win this game. There is a large talent disparity between these two squads, and it is essentially the same thing as a football team paying a small school to beat them by 40.

The spread for this one is Florida -21.5, and the total is set at 142.5. With zero data points and a lot of uncertainty about who will be the key scorers for Florida, we have no pick on either number for this game.

If you have money on one of these sides, godspeed, and good luck.

All that fans should be looking for tonight is an efficient, confident performance. The past few seasons have seen Gator teams with slow, clunky offenses and a lack of explosiveness.

If the Gators can show some of that tonight and win convincingly, the opener will be a success.