Todd Golden details Denzel Aberdeen’s return to Florida after season at Kentucky
By Andrew Olson
Published:
For the second time, Denzel Aberdeen is a newcomer for Todd Golden‘s Florida Gators.
Following his senior season at Kentucky, Aberdeen made the surprising announcement that he had entered his name into the NCAA transfer portal. Aberdeen soon committed to Florida for a return to UF, where he collected a national championship ring as a member of Golden’s Gators.
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Golden met with the media on Wednesday and, as expected, was asked about Aberdeen.
“We missed him last year, and he missed us,” Golden said.
The Florida coach maintained that last year’s separation was because the player and the program didn’t agree on compensation for 2025-26.
“I think it was one of those things where we’re constantly evolving in this new world, trying to sort out through the rev shares, through the NILs, and it’s not always going to be a perfect discussion,” Golden said. “And we each kind of went our separate ways last year, and that’s the nature of this business right now.”
While many Florida fans were upset by Aberdeen leaving UF after a national championship to play at Kentucky, Golden didn’t feel animosity toward Aberdeen.
“And there were no hard feelings,” Golden said. “There was no animosity that way between him and I. And it was a very quick conversation, like, ‘Hey, you wanna come back? He’s like, ‘Yes, I do.’ I thought, ‘All right, great. Let’s go.'”
There’s still, though, a matter to settle. Aberdeen has played in 4 college basketball seasons. He’s asking for his freshman season, in which he played only 41 minutes, to be considered a redshirt year and allow him to be eligible for 2026-27.
“Obviously, we’re gonna fight to get his additional year and allow him to be a part of our team and play again,” Golden said Wednesday.
Florida HC Todd Golden spoke on bringing back Denzel Aberdeen despite transferring to Kentucky last season.
— Andrew Abadie (@AndrewAbadie) April 22, 2026
“We missed him last year, and he missed us…There were no hard feelings.” #Gators
Full story: https://t.co/CcY8IvTrne pic.twitter.com/4yd1o0meLy
This past season at Kentucky, Aberdeen posted the best numbers of his career. A 35-game starter, Aberdeen averaged 13.5 points, 3.4 assists and 2.5 rebounds per contest. He scored in double figures 27 times, including leading UK’s offensive effort in 8 contests.
On the 2024-25 national championship team, Aberdeen played 773 minutes over 39 appearances (19.8 per game), including 5 starts. He averaged 7.7 points per game for the season, but 14.4 ppg in his 5 starts. He was a double-figure scorer in 10 games, including back-to-back outings of 20 points or more.
Andrew writes about sports to fund his love of live music and collection of concert posters. He strongly endorses the Hall of Fame campaigns of Fred Taylor and Andruw Jones.
