Out Of All The New SEC Coaches, Mike White Will Go Down As The Best Hire
A few years back, the SEC made a big time effort in bringing in known basketball coaches. Over these last few years we’ve seen names like Rick Barnes, Bruce Pearl, Bryce Drew, Avery Johnson, Ben Howland, Will Wade and Cuonzo Martin all hired within the conference.
However, the one that is going to end up going down as the best hire is down in Florida and Mike White. After spending four years at Louisiana Tech, he was hired back before the 2015-16 season at Florida. He’s won at least 21 games in the three seasons he’s been at Florida and already has a trip to the Elite Eight under his belt.
Just as important though he’s starting to build something. The first couple years of a new coach is always a bit different as you wonder how much it is the coach vs players brought in by the previous coaching staff. With White that’s not the case
This continues to be true as he just brought in Tre Mann, a top-30 prospect in the class of 2019. Mann chose Florida yesterday over North Carolina and Tennessee. He has the No. 19 recruiting class coming in this year, led by 5-star point guard Andrew Nembhard and 4-star shooting guard Noah Locke.
On top of all that, he’s using a system that players want to go play in. He likes to get the ball and spread the offense. Florida is willing to run, but don’t necessarily look to play fast. Instead they want to spread the floor offensively, slash and kick and look to shoot threes. Last year they shot threes on 40% of all possessions.
Florida has been a successful program – that’s obvious. But, they were always in a bit of weird spot as they were overshadowed by their own football program and then Kentucky in the SEC. But, it was typically viewed as Kentucky, Florida and then the rest. Mike White is determined to keep it that way as the conference gets better. Florida has updated facilities, a young coach that’s playing a fun style and is recruiting at a pretty high level.
While the SEC gets better, I’ll take what Mike White is doing at Florida as the best hire of this new bunch. Don’t be surprised to see them playing in the second weekend again this year.