Florida basketball is playing six of its 13 non-conference games on neutral floors. Here's why.

Florida basketball will begin a stretch of three straight neutral-court games when it faces Richmond on Saturday at the Orange Bowl Classic in Sunrise (4 p.m., SEC Network).

Overall, the Florida Gators will end up playing six of its 13 non-conference on neutral sites, a trend that second-year coach Todd Golden expects to continue in future seasons. After Saturday's game, Florida will face East Carolina in Lakeland on Dec. 14, then take on Michigan at the Jumpman Classic in Charlotte, N.C., on Dec. 19.

"Neutrals are good games, generally speaking," Golden said. "Because you’re generally getting a 50-50 (officiating) crew, and you’re getting an opportunity to go play in a setting that’s pretty equal, whereas you get these home-and-homes, and you can see where when you go on the road it’s going to be awfully challenging."

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So far, Florida is 1-2 in neutral-court contests. The lone win came on Nov. 22 over Pittsburgh (86-71) at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y., at the NIT Season Tip-Off Tournament. Florida lost 73-70 to No. 23 Virginia in the Naismith Hall of Fame Series in Charlotte and 95-91 to No. 6 Baylor in Brooklyn in the NIT Season Tip-Off.

Why is Florida basketball playing so many neutral-court games?

Under NCAA Division I basketball rules, teams can schedule 27 non-exempt games and up to four games as part of an exempt tournament. The NIT Season Tip-Off, with its two games in Brooklyn, is an exempt event.

Games in Brooklyn and Charlotte were played at NBA arenas, replicating an atmosphere that UF hopes to achieve in March if it can reach the NCAA Tournament.

UF's games in Sunrise and Lakeland give Gator fans and alumni from different parts of a state a chance to watch the team without having to drive to Gainesville.

The flip side is the high number of neutral-court games takes away from the inventory of games for students and local season ticket holders. Florida will play 15 games at the O'Connell Center, nine conference games and six non-conference contests. Its lone power five non-conference at home this season was rival Florida State, a game the Gators won soundly 89-68.

"The abundance of these one-offs in neutral sites, what concerns me about those is those are games that are essentially removed from the season ticket holder and the student fan," Sporting News national basketball writer Mike DeCourcy said. "They are taken out of their possible complement of games to watch and placed in a place that often isn't that interested."

Florida is merely following a national trend. Also on Saturday, Indiana will play Auburn in Atlanta, Ga., and No. 4 Purdue will go north of the border to face Alabama in Toronto, which is the hometown of Purdue All-American center Zach Edey.

The risks of scheduling non-conference home and homes

College basketball coaches have become less inclined to schedule home-and-home non-conference series as conference schedules have expanded, The SEC increased from 16 to 18 conference games in 2012. The Big Ten moved up to 20 conference games in 2018.

Playing on the road puts younger players in hostile environments and the whistles, sometimes, aren't always fair. In Florida's lone true road at Wake Forest in the ACC/SEC Challenge, the Gators lost 82-71. Wake Forest went to the free-throw line 29 times compared to 19 trips for the Gators.

"Coaches are too concerned about taking losses in those circumstances," DeCourcy said. "I don’t think they are as punitive as the coaches fear, but they are the ones with not only NCAA Tournament qualifications at stake but in many cases their actual jobs.”

The reward is substantial for the risk involved. Road wins are weighted higher in the NCAA Net Standings, on which the NCAA Tournament Selection Committe leans heavily come March. A road loss, meanwhile, isn't weighed as high as a neutral-court loss.

Next season, UF will face FSU on the road but presumably will get an ACC opponent to come to the O'Connell Center for the ACC/SEC Challenge. The prospect of a marquee opponent such as Duke or North Carolina coming to the O'Connell Center would be a boon for attendance, which has lagged in recent seasons. So far, Florida has averaged 7,631 fans per game at the 10,100-seat O'Dome.

Golden is content with how UF has navigated through its non-conference schedule, with five of its first eight games coming against Power Five conference opponents.

"The schedule’s been challenging, but again, I think this team can handle it," Golden said. "Obviously, I’d probably prefer one more win than we have right now, and I think everybody would be pretty satisfied with that, you know, and with all those things being said, we have played one of the toughest schedules."

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