Florida Gators forward DeVon Walker informed the team late last week that he had decided to transfer, and the program officially announced his decision on Monday.

Gators head coach Billy Donovan wished Walker well in a school release.

“DeVon has a bright future, and we hope for the best for him wherever he chooses to go,” Donovan said.

Walker played in 24 games as a true freshman but averaged just 4.0 minutes per contest. He scored 20 points in 99 total minutes during the 2012-13 campaign, making just 4-of-22 shots (1-of-7 threes) while grabbing 17 rebounds.

The second Florida freshman to transfer this month, Walker joins guard Braxton Ogbueze as 2012 commitments hoping the pastures are greener elsewhere.

“I’ve grown a lot this year, and I’m grateful to Coach Donovan, the staff and my teammates at Florida for everything,” Walker said in the same release.

Over the last two offseasons, the Gators have added three transfers including forward Dorian Finney-Smith and center Damontre Harris in 2012 and guard Eli Carter on April 30. Finney-Smith and Harris will both be active for the 2013-14 season, while Carter is hoping the NCAA approves a waiver that would allow him to play immediately without sitting out a year.

Florida also has a pair of five-star prospects – point guard Kasey Hill (Clermont, FL) and F/C Chris Walker (Bonifay, FL) – joining the program next season.

Minutes would have been hard to come by for both DeVon Walker and Ogbueze. The Gators will have just 11 scholarship players on the roster for the upcoming season should Hill and Chris Walker both be cleared academically.

Tags: Billy Donovan, Braxton Ogbueze, Chris Walker, Damontre Harris, DeVon Walker, Dorian Finney-Smith, Eli Carter, Kasey Hill, NCAA

Florida Gators guard Braxton Ogbueze informed the team that he had decided to transfer and was granted his release from the school on Wedesday.

Gators head coach Billy Donovan announced in a press release that Ogbueze, who averaged 4.7 minutes per game during his true freshman season last year, will no longer with the program going forward.

“Braxton has been a hard worker with a great attitude, and we wish him nothing but the best as he moves on,” Donovan said.

“I’ve appreciated the opportunity here at Florida and have learned a lot that will help me in the future,” Ogbueze said in the same release.

The player’s family had been murmuring about a transfer when Ogbueze failed to see significant court time during the 2012-13 season. With UF adding Rutgers transfer guard Eli Carter to the fold on Tuesday, Ogbueze obviously felt that he would have a better chance to succeed elsewhere.

A four-star prospect in 2012 and the No. 78 overall recruit in the country according to Rivals, Ogbueze originally chose Florida over Baylor. He committed on March 9, 2011.

The Gators now have an open scholarship for the 2013-14 season though it is unlikely to be filled over the summer. Carter will file a waiver with the NCAA to skip his redshirt transfer season and be eligible to play immediately for Florida.

Ogbueze is the second true Gators transfer (Walter Pitchford) since Florida lost four members of its 2008 recruiting class (Allan Chaney, Kenny Kadji, Ray Shipman, Eloy Vargas). Cody Larson gave up basketball before the 2012-13 season and Nimrod Tishman, after joining UF for the 2009-10 campaign, moved back to Israel.

Tags: Billy Donovan, Braxton Ogbueze, Eli Carter

Updated: Friday, May 10 at 3:00 p.m.

For the second time in the last four offeasons, Florida Gators basketball has added a transfer from the Rutgers Scarlet Knights as guard Eli Carter on Tuesday announced his intent to continue his career in Gainesville, FL.

“Proud to announce that I will be continuing my career at the University of Florida !! #Gators,” he tweeted at approximately 2 p.m.

Once former Rutgers head coach Mike Rice was fired for physically and emotionally bullying his players, a number of Scarlet Knights informed the school that they would be transferring. Carter (Paterson, NJ), a former three-star prospect and the No. 114 recruit in the nation as ranked by Rivals in 2011, first narrowed his options down to Florida and Maryland before deciding to pull the trigger for the Gators on Tuesday.

After Florida assistant Rashon Burno – who like Carter and Mike Rosario attended St. Anthony’s High School in New Jersey under head coach Bob Hurley – reached out to the player in early April, Gators head coach Billy Donovan flew up north to meet with Carter and his family in their home on April 22.

Donovan convinced him to visit Florida and he obliged, spending time in Gainesville on Sunday and Monday. While in town, Carter told the Gators he would be attending Florida but made his intentions officially known to the public on Tuesday.

“Eli is a great addition to our team, and we’re pleased he’s a Gator now,” Donovan said in a school release on May 10. “I’m excited to get down to Florida, and I can’t wait to start gelling with the team and the coaches,” Carter added.

Continue Reading » Rutgers transfer Eli Carter commits to Florida

Tags: Billy Donovan, Eli Carter, Mike Rosario, Rashon Burno, Rutgers Scarlet Knights

Florida Gators center Patric Young, who announced just over one week ago that he would return to the team for his senior season, underwent minor surgery on Friday to remove a bone spur from his right ankle.

Young has been seen on crutches and wearing a boot; he has even been tweeting about his ailment without providing specifics. The Independent Florida Alligator‘s Landon Watnick, on Tuesday, received official confirmation from the University Athletic Association that the surgery had taken place.

“Everything went great thanks for the prayers,” Young tweeted on Friday, likely after the surgery had been completed. “Not exactly my ideal Saturday,” he wrote a day later. “Home alone and bed ridden.”

Bone spurs can develop in the ankle due to extensive pressure or stress on the joint.

After spending his first year with the Gators as a reserve, Young has served as Florida’s starting center over the last two seasons, averaging 10.2 points and 6.4 rebounds in 26.5 minutes per game in each campaign. Head coach Billy Donovan has chided Young for his inconsistency on occasion in order to get the absolute most out of him on a game-to-game basis. Nevertheless, the two have a great player-coach relationship.

It will likely take at least six weeks for Young to fully recover from the surgery, putting him on track to return to the court in June.

A new NCAA rule instituted prior to the 2012-13 season allows college players to practice with their coaches for up to two hours per day (at a maximum of eight hours per week) during the summer months.

Donovan will be recruiting for the Gators until mid-June, when he will join USA Basketball’s under-19 team in Colorado Springs, CO to train for the 2013 FIBA U19 World Championship set for June 17-July 7 in Prague, Czech Republic.

Florida’s assistant coaches will be in Gainesville, FL working with the team when they are not participating in the three four-day July evaluation periods.

Photo Credit: David J. Phillip/Associated Press

Tags: Billy Donovan, Patric Young

Florida Gators head basketball coach Billy Donovan met with the media on Wednesday to wrap up the 2012-13 season and look ahead to next year.

A MESSAGE TO THE TEAM: “WE GOT TO GET NASTIER.”

Donovan has not yet met with the Gators as an entire team for a postseason send-off into the summer (that will happen soon enough) but does have plenty on his agenda as it pertains to helping Florida improve in the offseason.

“We need to get better as a team in every area. I thought we did make some really good strides this year on the defensive end of the floor. … We didn’t score the ball as much or as well as I think we’re capable of for whatever reason. We’ve got to continue to try and get better there in that area,” he said. “[I’m] trying to figure out what we can do better in practice, what we can do better coaching staff-wise, what we can do better coaching these guys all the way around.”

One other area in which Donovan stressed that the Gators need to improve is overall team mentality. Basically, he wants Florida as a team to be tougher and more resilient. In other words, he envisions the Gators playing like one of the program’s greatest players did on a consistent, night-in, night-out basis.

“I didn’t create Joakim Noah’s passion, energy, intensity, heart, toughness. I didn’t create that. That was in there. I think as a coaching staff we fostered it. That’s an area our guys need to get better,” he explained.

“We need to be more relentless. We need to be tougher. We need a mental will. We have to be better there. When adversity hits and those things hit, we got to get tougher, we got to get more competitive, we got to get nastier, we got to have more of that internal drive and will in those moments. I think we displayed some of that [this year]. I think there were games where we really displayed that. … I think we got the capability, but we got to be more consistent doing that.”

Read much, much more from Donovan on Florida basketball..after the break!
Continue Reading » 4/10: Donovan wraps up season and speaks about Young, Yeguete, transfers, freshmen & more

Tags: Billy Donovan, Chris Walker, Damontre Harris, Dorian Finney-Smith, Kasey Hill, Patric Young, Scottie Wilbekin, Will Yeguete

A position of relative weakness for men’s basketball over the last two seasons has suddenly become one of immense strength as the Florida Gators officially announced on Monday that center Patric Young will return to school for his senior season.

“I have the chance to finish my degree and play another season for Coach [Billy] Donovan with great teammates and friends at a place I love,” said Young in a school release. “These first three years have gone by in a flash, and I can’t believe it is my senior year already. I have gotten better as a player and better as a man at the University of Florida. I believe God has my future in his hands, so all I am worried about now is getting better this summer and making it the hardest I have trained in my life.”

After spending his first year with the Gators as a reserve, Young has served as Florida’s starting center over the last two seasons, averaging 10.2 points and 6.4 rebounds in 26.5 minutes per game in each campaign. Donovan has chided Young for his consistency on occasion in order to get the absoulte most out of him on a game-to-game basis but the two have a great player-coach relationship.

“We’re excited that Patric will continue with us for his senior season,” said Donovan in the school release. “This was Patric’s decision to make, and he ultimately had to do what he felt was best for himself and his future.”

Young likely would have been a second-round pick in the upcoming 2013 NBA Draft had he declared and left school early.

Though stretch-four Erik Murphy (6’10″, 238 lbs.) had started alongside him, Young (6’9”, 249 lbs.) has been the Gators’ true big man and the only player on the team who could legitimately play center for an entire game.

That will not be the case next season as, with Young returning, Florida will boast arguably the best frontcourt in the nation.

Joining Young, the two-time SEC Scholar-Athlete of the Year, will be junior transfer Damontre Harris (6’10”, 228 lbs.) and five-star freshman Chris Walker (6’9”, 220 lbs.). Forwards Will Yeguete (6’7” 240 lbs.) and Casey Prather (6’6”, 208 lbs.) will both return for their senior seasons, and Florida will finally get to see sophomore transfer Dorian Finney-Smith (6’8”, 205 lbs.) in action.

The Gators will be able to rotate at least six players in their three frontcourt positions but will need to develop the backcourt after losing starting guards Kenny Boynton and Mike Rosario to graduation. Point guard Scottie Wilbekin will be the only other returning member of Florida’s starting five aside from Young.

Photo Credit: David J. Phillip/Associated Press

Tags: Billy Donovan, Casey Prather, Chris Walker, Damontre Harris, Dorian Finney-Smith, Draft, NBA, Patric Young, Scholar-Athlete of the Year, Scottie Wilbekin, SEC, Will Yeguete

1 » The Washington Wizards announced Wednesday that rookie guard Bradley Beal will miss the remainder of the season with what the team described as a “stress injury in his right fibula.” Beal also dealt with ankle, wrist and back problems during the year, missing 18 contests scattered throughout the season (including stretches of five, six and five games) before returning on March 31 and scoring 24 points on 8-of-14 shooting (6-of-9 from downtown). He struggled in his next game on April 2, going just 3-for-11 (1-for-4 from three) and has now been shut down for the final eight games of the season. In all, Beal will miss 26-of-82 games (.317); he played in 56 and made 46 starts. He averaged 13.9 points, 3.8 assists and 2.4 rebounds during his rookie campaign, shooting .410 from the field, .386 from beyond the arc and .786 from three free throw line. Beal, the No. 3 overall pick in the 2012 NBA Draft, registered a career-high 29 points against New York on March 1 and was named Eastern Conference Rookie of the Month for both December and January. The Wizards expect Beal “to resume basketball-related activities in approximately six weeks.”

2 » Florida Gators five-star power forward commitment Chris Walker (Bonifay, FL) participated in the 2013 Powerade Jam Fest on Monday and wound up winning the contest, taking down other five-star recruits like Jabari Parker and Andrew Wiggins in the process. Check out the video below to see a recap of the event including all of Walker’s winning dunks. He and fellow five-star pledge point guard Kasey Hill (Clermont, FL) will be participating in the 2013 McDonald’s All-American Game which airs Wednesday on ESPN at 9:30 p.m.

CLICK TO EXPAND and read an two more BITS after the break!

Tags: Billy Donovan, Bradley Beal, Chris Walker, Draft, Kasey Hill, NBA, NFL, Powerade Jam Fest, Ray McDonald, Rex Grossman, Richard Pitino, Washington Redskins, Washington Wizards

1 » Though nothing at all is finalized, the City of Jacksonville is working towards holding the Navy-Marine Corps Classic for a second-straight season and hopes to reach a deal with the U.S. Navy to do so at some point over the next few months. “The City of Jacksonville would like to continue the game and is working on a proposal to the Navy that includes several options for the 2013 Navy-Marine Corps Classic,” executive director Alan Verlander told OGGOA last Thursday. The proposal set to be delivered to the Navy includes contingencies and/or solutions to avoid the condensation issue that ended the 2012 game at halftime last year. The City of Jacksonville has also had “very preliminary” talks with programs about potentially participating in the game (with the Florida Gators being an obvious preference as the local team) but is waiting until the conclusion of March Madness before continuing to gauge interest from said teams.

2 » Grantland’s Zach Lowe sat down with Washington Wizards guard Bradley Beal for a wide-ranging interview about his rookie season. In the question-and-answer session, Beal discusses his ankle injuries, playing with John Wall, watching Florida in the postseason, playing in the NBA and where he feels most comfortable on the court.

CLICK TO EXPAND and read two more BITS in this post.

Tags: Billy Donovan, Bradley Beal, Jeremy Foley, Navy-Marine Corps Classic, NBA, NFL, Percy Harvin, Seattle Seahawks, Washington Wizards