Billy Donovan's final year at UF, the decision was made by the higher ups that the Gators would bus to Athens to play Georgia. At the time the Gators were 11-5 with all five losses to ranked teams, among them UNC, Kansas and national champ UConn. The Gators were off to a 2-0 start in SEC play.
The bus ride was five hours. Pre-game Billy Donovan is VERY unhappy and asks, "Do you think they have to go through this kind of s#4*t at Kentucky?" Right then and there I knew he was as good as gone.
Rather than do the right thing and build a BRAND NEW ARENA fitting of a coach who did the impossible by winning two national championships, taking the Gators to four Final Fours and eight elite eights, the geniuses in charge decided to put a lipstick on a pig, otherwise known as the O-Dome. The cost was going to be $40 million, then $68 after they fired one contractor and brought in professionals to clean up the mess. I'm told by people who know that with the overruns the final cost was between $80 and $90 million. Did you know that the state of the art Pavilion at Ole Miss, which seats 10,000 and doesn't have a single seat more than 45 feet from the court, cost $92 million? Did you know that Auburn Arena, which doesn't have a single seat more than 43 feet from the court and seats 9,500 ... and is a wonderful arena, cost $85 million? A brand new arena could have been built fitting of Billy Donovan but nooooo ... the O-Dome is in the heart of the campus and so it was lipstick on the pig time. The O-Dome could have been converted into the indoor practice facility with a tunnel leading under Lemerand Drive to connect to the South End Zone locker rooms. A state of the art weight room could have been put in. But noooo ... the O-Dome had to be renovated. The new football practice facility eliminated a grass practice field. Do you know how many grass practice fields they have at Ohio State? Six. Plus their indoor. Four at LSU and Alabama. Plus their indoor facilities.
And some wonder why Billy Donovan left for the NBA. His heart was here and I think it still is, but he got tired of administration that wouldn't give him the resources necessary to land the kind of recruits that wanted to be Gators. He got tired of losing recruits because UF had (and still has) sub-par facilities. Our practice facility was thought to be as good as it gets in 2006. Well, this is 2022 and our facility is somewhere around 10th best in the SEC. The O-Dome is aesthetically better than it was in 2015 but it's still a pig and it's still lipstick.
The same facilities problems that have been an issue for football for decades and are now only being addressed and completed by Scott Stricklin are still an issue for basketball. Yes the O-Dome looks better. It's a dump. The practice facility is okay. There are dozens of other issues that need to be addressed.
Everybody wants UF to be a national power again like it was during the Billy Donovan days. Well, take a moment and understand why Billy left, then ask yourself how much has changed?
The bus ride was five hours. Pre-game Billy Donovan is VERY unhappy and asks, "Do you think they have to go through this kind of s#4*t at Kentucky?" Right then and there I knew he was as good as gone.
Rather than do the right thing and build a BRAND NEW ARENA fitting of a coach who did the impossible by winning two national championships, taking the Gators to four Final Fours and eight elite eights, the geniuses in charge decided to put a lipstick on a pig, otherwise known as the O-Dome. The cost was going to be $40 million, then $68 after they fired one contractor and brought in professionals to clean up the mess. I'm told by people who know that with the overruns the final cost was between $80 and $90 million. Did you know that the state of the art Pavilion at Ole Miss, which seats 10,000 and doesn't have a single seat more than 45 feet from the court, cost $92 million? Did you know that Auburn Arena, which doesn't have a single seat more than 43 feet from the court and seats 9,500 ... and is a wonderful arena, cost $85 million? A brand new arena could have been built fitting of Billy Donovan but nooooo ... the O-Dome is in the heart of the campus and so it was lipstick on the pig time. The O-Dome could have been converted into the indoor practice facility with a tunnel leading under Lemerand Drive to connect to the South End Zone locker rooms. A state of the art weight room could have been put in. But noooo ... the O-Dome had to be renovated. The new football practice facility eliminated a grass practice field. Do you know how many grass practice fields they have at Ohio State? Six. Plus their indoor. Four at LSU and Alabama. Plus their indoor facilities.
And some wonder why Billy Donovan left for the NBA. His heart was here and I think it still is, but he got tired of administration that wouldn't give him the resources necessary to land the kind of recruits that wanted to be Gators. He got tired of losing recruits because UF had (and still has) sub-par facilities. Our practice facility was thought to be as good as it gets in 2006. Well, this is 2022 and our facility is somewhere around 10th best in the SEC. The O-Dome is aesthetically better than it was in 2015 but it's still a pig and it's still lipstick.
The same facilities problems that have been an issue for football for decades and are now only being addressed and completed by Scott Stricklin are still an issue for basketball. Yes the O-Dome looks better. It's a dump. The practice facility is okay. There are dozens of other issues that need to be addressed.
Everybody wants UF to be a national power again like it was during the Billy Donovan days. Well, take a moment and understand why Billy left, then ask yourself how much has changed?
