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Todd Golden updates status of Florida bigs Colin Castleton, Jason Jitoboh

On3 imageby:Zach Abolverdi•05/28/22•

ZachAbolverdi

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Photo by Hannah White/UAA Communications.

Florida men’s basketball coach Todd Golden provided injury updates on UF bigs Colin Castleton and Jason Jitoboh prior to his speech at the Fightin’ Gator Touchdown Club.

Castleton torn his labrum in January but returned to the starting lineup after six games, playing the final 12 through the injury and postponing surgery until after the season.

Castleton announced April 11 he was returning for a fifth year. Golden gave the latest on the All-SEC selection‘s activity level with the team starting summer workouts on June 6.

“He had surgery; it was a while ago now. I talked to Duke [Werner] (Wednesday) about it and knock on wood things are going well in terms of his recovery,” Golden said of Colin Castleton. “We’re going to take our time. We don’t need to rush him back for summer workouts. I want him to be super healthy going into the fall and if we can do that, which we are tracking towards, we’ll be in really good shape.”

Jason Jitoboh stepped up with Castleton sidelined, making his first career start in UF’s 80-72 win over Mississippi State and scoring a career-high 12 points at Ole Miss.

But the following game, Jitoboh suffered a “significant” eye injury against Tennessee and had season-ending surgery two days later.

Golden said Jitoboh is “getting close” to being fully recovered.

“He’s battling the eye deal still a little bit. He’s done a really good job the past couple of weeks with his body, just getting back into shape that way,” Golden said. “I’m really encouraged by him in terms of going back last year and seeing how productive he was and how high of a level the team was playing when he was on the floor. If we can keep him healthy, I think he has a chance to be a really impactful player for us this year.”

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