Florida's Todd Golden Shades Kentucky After Win in SEC Tournament, 'They Haven't Led for One Minute'

The Florida Gators men's basketball team advanced to the semifinals of the SEC tournament with a 71-63 victory over Kentucky on Friday, and head coach Todd Golden didn't hesitate to let the Wildcats know about it.

"We did what we needed to do, I would have preferred to win this game by 20," he said during his postgame interview on ESPN. "But we'll take this eight-point win. You know, in the three games we played these guys, they haven't led for one minute."

Alex Condon led the way in Florida's latest win against its conference rival with a double-double of 22 points, 10 rebounds and two blocks on 7-of-12 shooting from the field.

The Gators defense also set the tone and held Kentucky to 36 percent shooting from the field and 22 percent shooting from deep. Denzel Aberdeen was the only Wildcats starter to score more than 10 points, which was more of the same for a Florida group that is fourth in the nation in defensive rating, per Ken Pom.

If the Gators continue to play like that on the defensive end of the floor, they could very well be cutting down the nets on the way to the Final Four in the coming weeks.

But first they get to celebrate their season-long dominance over Kentucky.

Golden's team beat the Wildcats at home by nine on Valentine's Day, followed that up with a seven-point win on the road to finish the regular season on Saturday and then went a perfect 3-0 thanks to Friday's victory.

Florida Gets Over Kentucky 🐊

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That all three games finished with a single-digit margin makes it all the more surprising that Kentucky didn't lead for a single minute since it wasn't exactly blown out, but the Gators still left little doubt who the better team was with the sweep.

Golden surely took pleasure in handling Kentucky so many times this season since the Wildcats won their only matchup last season. It was one of the only disappointing things of the 2024-25 campaign for Florida considering it ended with an SEC tournament title and a national title.

Now the reigning champions will turn their attention toward doing the same this season after the latest dispatching of Kentucky.