Florida honors title team with Final Four floor in practice facility
By David Wasson
Published:
The Florida Gators keep adding to their life-sized memorabilia collection, as the basketball program unveiled another slice of Final Four replica court over the Christmas break.
The floor, a replica of the surface the Gators won the 2024-25 NCAA Tournament on in San Antonio, now hangs at the Hugh Hathcock Basketball Complex along with replica center-court logo slices from the Gators’ 1994, 2000, 2006, and 2014 Final Four appearances.
The 2007 piece that also hangs on the wall is a chunk of the actual floor from the Georgia Dome in Atlanta. Florida purchased that floor from the NCAA after winning the national title and sold pieces as memorabilia to fans but kept the center-court logo for display.
The Gators also bought the 2006 Final Four court from when they won the national title at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis but sanded it down and repurposed it to as a replacement for the aged-out court at the O’Connell Center.
” We’re incredibly proud to bring more hardware into our practice facility. The floors on the wall remind us of all the great success that has created the history, tradition and success of this program,” Florida coach Todd Golden said. “To be able to add to that after three years is really special – and we hope to add some more in the future.”
An APSE national award-winning writer and editor, David Wasson has almost four decades of experience in the print journalism business in Florida and Alabama. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and several national magazines and websites. He also hosts Gulfshore Sports with David Wasson, weekdays from 3-5 pm across Southwest Florida and on FoxSportsFM.com. His Twitter handle: @JustDWasson.
