There is no other way to phrase it than Florida beat FSU 78-76 on Tuesday, but there is a flaw brewing on the team that is impossible to ignore. Simply put, the Gators can't shoot.
The Gators used their size to ultimately pull away from the Seminoles, but until Florida finds perimeter shooting, the ceiling for this squad is going to be severely limited.
Florida hangs on and survives against FSU
Thomas Haugh had 20 points and 13 rebounds to lead the way. Boogie Fland chipped in with 18 points while Rueben Chinyelu had 16 rebounds on the night.
The Gators had 17 offensive rebounds compared to FSU coming down with just eight.
But Florida struggled to put FSU away until the very end and even found themselves trailing in the second half. Ultimately, it was 14 fast break points to FSU's one in the second half that opened up the scoring and allowed Florida to do just enough.
Because in half-court sets, Florida has no one who can shoot the ball from deep. The Gators were 6/31 from three for a meseley 19.4%.
If this were just a one-off day, there wouldn't be cause for alarm. For example, last year, when Florida lost to Tennessee on the road, it had an awful shooting day.
But three games into the season, the Gators are 335th out of 362 teams in the country when it comes to three-point shooting.
Xaivian Lee was 1-10 from three on Tuesday, Urban Klavzar was 1-4, and Fland was 2-7 from deep.
The issue is that while Florida can rely on its frontcourt to overcome weaker teams like UNF and FSU, at some point, like let's say a team like Arizona, teams are going to have just enough size to force someone to hit a shot.
And since Walter Clayton Jr. isn't walking through that door, Todd Golden and his staff need to keep mixing and matching until they can find someone, litteraly anyone, capable of hitting a shot from beyond the arc.