GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Florida coach Todd Golden had folks yelling at him at halftime Thursday night time to get 7-foot-9 heart Olivier Rioux into the sport.
Golden relented with 2:09 to play — and made historical past within the course of — after chants of “We Need Ollie” swept by way of the O’Connell Heart.
Rioux turned the tallest individual to ever play school basketball when he made his debut in a 104-64 victory over North Florida. Rioux, a 19-year-old redshirt freshman from Canada and the world’s tallest teenager, drew a lot consideration from the Ospreys that he didn’t even contact the ball.
“It felt nice,” Rioux stated. “The help from everyone was superb, even on the bench and even the followers. I feel everyone supported me. I’m very grateful.”
When requested about making historical past, Rioux quipped: “It’s one other day, I suppose.”
Rioux made everybody in attendance smile. Even North Florida ahead Trey Cady smirked when he measured himself towards Rioux. Cady was giving up greater than a foot within the matchup.
“There’s folks yelling at me at halftime about enjoying him,” Golden stated. “I’m like, ‘Hear, it can occur. The time will come.'”
Rioux is 2 inches taller than former NBA giants Gheorghe Muresan and Manute Bol, and three inches taller than widespread massive males Yao Ming, Tacko Fall and Shawn Bradley. He already owned a spot in Guinness World Data when he signed with Florida in 2024.
Golden gave Rioux the choice of enjoying sparingly final season or taking a redshirt season and dealing on his recreation. Rioux selected the latter. Nonetheless, he was a strolling viral video, from using his bike on campus, to ducking below each doorway, to reducing down nets whereas standing flat-footed throughout Florida’s NCAA event run.
“He’s put in numerous nice work,” Golden stated. “To his credit score, he’s saved an incredible angle with out getting numerous reward by way of enjoying time and alternative.”
Golden had made it clear that Rioux would play solely late in blowouts, the results of having all 4 frontcourt gamers returning. However Rioux doubled down on eager to be at Florida and welcomed the problem of enjoying towards Alex Condon, Thomas Haugh, Rueben Chinyelu and Micah Handlogten in observe and behind them in video games.
“I talked to the blokes at halftime after we’re up 24 and I expressed to them the significance of getting off to a extremely good begin so we are able to get a number of the youthful guys and a number of the guys from down on the bench a chance to play and to get some rip,” Golden stated. “Clearly the sport was in our management and thought it might be a very good alternative to get him on the market and get his first school expertise, and I feel he was fairly excited.
“It was fairly neat for him to lastly see the ground.”
Followers delivered the loudest ovation of the sport — second solely to Florida unveiling its championship banner throughout pregame introductions — when Golden motioned to Rioux on the finish of the bench. Rioux pulled off his long-sleeved T-shirt and hustled to the scorer’s desk to test in.
Teammates and coaches celebrated wildly, and followers screamed each time the ball received close to Rioux. He’ll have to attend till his subsequent outing to really contact it.
“A lot enjoyable,” Handlogten stated. “When he was checking into the sport, I form of stopped him and I used to be like, ‘Play with confidence. You’ve labored your butt off for 2 years now to get to this spot. Now’s your second. That is your time to shine.
“To see him on the market operating up and down the courtroom with a bit of smile on his face, it was actually good to see.”