History
The modern University of Florida was created in 1905, when the Florida Legislature passed the Buckman Act, consolidating four predecessor institutions to form the "University of the State of Florida." Ten years later, the university sponsored the first Florida Gators men's varsity basketball team that played its first season during the 1915–1916 school year under head coach C. J. McCoy. That first Gators team compiled a 5–1 record, but the following three seasons were canceled during and immediately after World War I. The team was restarted for the 1919–20 season without a professional coach, though the Gators did have a new venue—the newly-built University Gymnasium. Head coach William G. Kline, who also coached the Florida Gators football team, led the Gators basketball team from 1920 to 1922.
By the mid-1920s the team outgrew the University Gymnasium (now called the Women's Gymnasium), so the university built another gym to hold the crowds of the fast-growing student population. Dubbed the "New Gym," the Gators played there until 1949, when Florida Gymnasium was finished.
In December 1932, Florida joined the Southeastern Conference as one of its thirteen charter members.
The team moved from the Florida Gym to the O'Connell Center during the 1980–81 season.
For most of the first half-century in the SEC, the Gators were not a factor. They only finished higher than fourth twice from 1932–33 to 1979–80. This was partly because the Gators didn't have a full-time head coach for much of the first-half of the 20th century. Instead, the post was filled by assistant football coaches or volunteers from the physical education department. Things didn't really turn around until Norm Sloan arrived in Gainesville after a successful 14-year tenure at North Carolina State. Sloan had previously been the program's first full-time head coach, from 1960 to 1966. Under Sloan, the Gators made the National Invitation Tournament three years in a row from 1984 to 1986—only the second postseason appearances in school history (the Gators were invited to play in the NIT in 1969). In 1987, Vernon Maxwell led the team to the school's first ever NCAA Tournament appearance, advancing all the way to the Sweet 16. Sloan coached the team to the tournament again the following two years, winning the school's first-ever SEC regular season title in 1989. in the 1988–89 season. After a drug scandal involving Maxwell and an NCAA investigation for various rules violations, Sloan resigned and the NCAA placed the program on two years' probation. Former Tennessee coach Don DeVoe led the team as interim coach during the 1989–90 season.
Read more about this topic: Florida Gators Men's Basketball
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“All history is a record of the power of minorities, and of minorities of one.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The history of men’s opposition to women’s emancipation is more interesting perhaps than the story of that emancipation itself.”
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941)
“In the history of the United States, there is no continuity at all. You can cut through it anywhere and nothing on this side of the cut has anything to do with anything on the other side.”
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)