Boogie Fland injury update: Todd Golden ‘absolutely’ expects transfer guard to be ready

FloridaG Boogie Fland underwent a sports hernia surgery on July 3rd. His timeline for recovery, though, has now lined up exactly as the Gators planned with the school year having started down in Gainesville.

Todd Golden updated Fland’s status in an interview with Jon Rothstein on ‘Inside College Basketball Now’ released on Monday. He said they “absolutely” expect him to be ready by the time their practices begin, as the surgery came with a four-to-six week recovery that he should be essentially done with.

“Yeah, yeah, absolutely,” said Golden. “You know, we kind of took advantage of the timing and, you know, he had this at the beginning of July. I think he’ll be ready to go for the start of the school year. And, again, we kind of timed it that way to make sure he had the full fall going into camp to be ready to go.”

Florida provided their own story about Fland’s recovery last week. Chris Harry noted that Fland played last season with this tender hernia, which he later had this procedure on back in July. Now, “he’s on schedule to be cleared” to start their preseason workouts, which did begin last week to start the semester, writes Harry.

Fland spent last season at Arkansas, arriving a top-ten recruit and a four-star prospect as their top signee under John Calipari. Due to a thumb injury, Fland, who was originally to miss the remainder of the season but did eventually return for the NCAA Tournament, appeared in 21 games and averaged 13.5 points (37.9% FG, 34% 3PT on 1.7 makes), 5.1 assists, 3.2 rebounds, and 1.5 steals per game. He later entered the draft as well as the portal, being the No. 7 overall transfer and No. 3 PG according to On3’s 2025 Top Transfer Portal Players, and would commit to Florida back in May.

Fland, predicted to be Preseason All-SEC by Rothstein back in July, was the top-rated of three transfers this offseason for the Gators, alongside Xaivian Lee (Princeton – No. 39 overall, No. 10 PG per On3) and AJ Brown (Ohio – No. 84 overall). They’re now all key additions considering what all that Florida lost from last season’s title-winning backcourt.

“Yeah, I’ve been really, really impressed and really happy with (Lee and Fland),” Golden said. “Obviously, Boogie played a big role on Arkansas’ team last year as a freshman, and took some lumps but, I felt like, played some really good basketball. And now, going into his sophomore year, we’ll be able to get his best foot forward after having experienced some of those ups and downs. And, he had a great camp for us this summer.”

Fland missed the back half of summer workouts for his new team at Florida. However, per Golden, Fland should be about ready at this point of his recovery as the Gators get back on campus.