Patience Pays Off for Florida Gators Todd Golden in Final Four Run

We live in a world where microwave-speed attention spans make exhibiting patience an arduous task. Yet, Florida Gators head coach Todd Golden stayed the course after arriving in Gainesville with a plan. 

Regardless of what media write or fans comment, Golden's path to the University of Florida never deviated. 

Mastering the Portal

One of the newest hurdles of coaching is the transfer portal and how to successfully navigate the process. To his credit, the Gators coach seemed to maneuver through the tumult with ease, building a big part of his roster with transfers. 

"Obviously last year we had a good year, making it to the SEC tournament championship game, but fell short in the NCAA tournament,” said Golden this week ahead of the Gators’ clash with the Auburn Tigers in the Final Four. 

“We felt like we needed additional layers of toughness, physicality, experience to kind of bridge that gap for this nucleus we had returning. Did a great job keeping our nucleus. And then the addition of Alijah, Rueben, Sam, that group, just really finished this team. We have great guys that are unselfish, enjoy playing together."

Golden didn't stockpile talent just to roll out on the court. Instead, he added players that filled voids and bolstered the roster that already existed. Too often, teams will hit the portal and find mismatched pieces to add. Their thought pattern constantly falls apart when the absence of chemistry ultimately fails them in the end.

By the Numbers

Instead of hunches and strictly relying on intuition, Golden brings an analytics-heavy approach to the job. Like it or not, analytics are now an integral part of the game. It combines statistical analysis and playing the percentages. 

Old school coaches despise the approach as it takes some of the human factor out of the instinctual part of the game. Golden wholeheartedly believes in the process.

"We're very analytical in everything we do,” said Golden. “We talk about that a lot. Whether it's roster building, whether it's scheduling, deciding who I want to play, game scouting reports, et cetera. It's more than any one specific thing, the way I like to explain it, a macro-outlook on our decision-making and how we build out. 

“We try to gather as much data as we possibly can when it comes to any sort of decision, then make what decision that data tells us to make. Then we got to live with the consequences. It's not always going to work. Life is not perfect. You want to give yourself the best chance to be successful and live with the results."

Bottom Line

A decade ago, Golden sat on the Auburn sideline, as a 29-year-old assistant, just looking to make his bones inside the process. He took the lessons that Bruce Pearl provided him and implemented them. However, he's not a clone. 

Golden approaches the game in his own way, placing his own stamp on the Gators. 80 minutes separates him and Florida Gators immortality.

The Florida Gators take on the Auburn Tigers at 6:09 p.m. EST in the Final Four on CBS in San Antonio, Texas.