The suspension of Scottie Wilbekin to start the season pushed Kasey Hill into the starting point guard role for the Gators.
Through two games, the freshman has had his share of struggles.
Hill is tied for 150th in the nation with four assists per game, and his 13 missed shots are the most on the Gators.
However, he will have an opportunity to turn things around for No. 11 Florida against Arkansas-Little Rock on Saturday at 4:30 p.m. in the O’Connell Center.
Hill’s first road trip of his collegiate career ended with a 59-53 loss to No. 20 Wisconsin. Shooting 2 of 11 and fouling out with 3:25 in the game did not help his cause.
Coach Billy Donovan said Hill’s poor shooting performance not only contributed to him fouling out during a critical point of the game, but it also hurt his defensive play as well.
“I thought his lack of putting the ball in the basket really impacted him on the defensive end of the floor, being a young guy and all,” Donovan said. “He was visibly disappointed, upset, bothered. That led to some of his foul trouble. He has to be able to move to the next play.”
For the first time since Nick Calathes made his debut in 2007, the Gators started a freshman at point guard to open the season. In Calathes’ first two games of his career, he averaged 18 points per game on 43 percent shooting. He also averaged 5.5 assists.
Hill is averaging 9.5 points per game on 35 percent shooting, while averaging four assists.
Before the season started, Hill said he was a pass-first player. But with 20 shots so far, he has as many attempts as Patric Young, Will Yeguete and Jacob Kurtz combined.
There has not been a Florida team with fewer assists in the first two games of the season than this year’s squad since at least 1998. But Donovan, who was a point guard during his playing career at Providence, said he understands how difficult it is for Hill to manage a team as a freshman. With no other true point guard on the active roster, Hill is forced to carry the load in the backcourt.
“Obviously I’ve put him in a very difficult situation,” Donovan said.
“The fact that he’s a freshman and we don’t have another point guard right now on our team, and he’s got to absorb a lot of minutes. He’s kind of having to learn on the job, and I’m not so sure that’s the fairest thing to him. So there’s going to be some growing pains and some bumps and bruises on the way.”
With the season opener and the first road game out of the way, Donovan said he expects Hill to take what he learned and immediately start growing into a better player. Florida’s next three games are at home against mid-major schools.
“This is a good experience for him,” Donovan said. “Just the way he’s being guarded, what people are doing to him and how he needs to attack and play.”
Follow Jonathan Czupryn on Twitter @jczupryn.
Kasey Hill dribbles the ball during Florida’s 77-69 victory against North Florida on Nov. 8 in the O’Connell Center.
