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Florida Makes College Basketball History in NCAA Tournament

Originally posted on Athlon Sports | By Matt Wadleigh | Last updated Apr 8, 2025 11:09 AM ET

The No. 1 seed Florida Gators became national champions for the third time in program history with a 65-63 win over No. 1 Houston on Monday night.

Florida trailed at the half and in the second half before putting together a huge comeback that ended in stunning fashion.

Now, Todd Golden becomes the youngest head coach to win a national title, and the gritty, tough Gators are national champions for the first time since the Billy Donovan era.

What's even more impressive is how they did it.

Florida worked the portal hard to bring in some key guys, although it paid off in the end. Even more surprising is this fact pointed out by Isaac Trotter of CBS Sports.

"Florida is the first team in the modern era to win the National Championship without a top-100 recruit on the roster."

Trotter also wrote that "No national champion in the internet era of recruiting rankings has ever done that", so it's been a long time.

To go one step further, here are the original recruiting rankings of some of the Florida players.

Florida's starting lineup and
their original recruiting rankings:

Walter Clayton Jr.: 0⭐️
Alijah Martin: 0⭐️
Will Richard: 3⭐️
Alex Condon: 3⭐️
Rueben Chinyelu: 4⭐️

Rankings didn’t matter.
NATIONAL CHAMPS
— MaxPreps (@MaxPreps) April 8, 2025

Walter Clayton Jr. and Alijah Matrin were both unranked as basketball players coming out of high school, and both of them played football.

Clayton was recruited by Rick Pitino at Iona, and Martin began his career playing for Dusty May at Florida Atlantic before they transferred to Florida.

Will Richard, who led Florida with 18 points in the title game, was the No. 330 recruit in the Class of 2021. Florida big man Alex Condon was No. 214 and Thomas Haugh was No. 185, per Trotter.

Richard began his career at Belmont before transferring to Florida, and center Rueben Chinyelu played at Washington State before coming to Gainesville.

All in all, it's quite a change from top-notch teams such as Kentucky and Kansas who land five-stars year after year, but Florida made it work in the end and can now call themselves a national champion once again.

This article first appeared on Athlon Sports and was syndicated with permission.

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