Florida
Five Rehabilitated Manatees Return to Florida Waters After Several Years of Rehabilitation – Florida Daily
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The Manatee Rescue & Rehabilitation Partnership (MRP), a cooperative group of non-profit, private, state, and federal entities who work together to rescue, rehabilitate, release, and monitor sick and injured manatees– successfully released five orphaned manatees to Blue Spring State Park in Florida after a years’ long journey of rehabilitation by multiple members of the partnership.
The manatees were originally rescued by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) and MRP Partners between 2020 and 2021. SeaWorld Orlando, The Columbus Zoo and Aquarium, Brevard Zoo, Georgia Aquarium, Clearwater Marine Aquarium Research Institute, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Save the Manatee Club, partnered closely for several years to provide treatment to fully rehabilitate these orphaned calves. In a complex release operation that took all day to complete, the sea cows are now safely home in Florida waters.
“Over the past several years, we have been called upon to rescue an increasing number of injured, sick, and orphaned manatees,” said Virginia Edmonds, President of the Manatee Rescue and Rehabilitation Partnership. “We are grateful to our partners for stepping up to the plate to not only rescue animals in need, but to commit countless hours to the collective rehabilitation of these animals, which enabled the releases today. But our work doesn’t stop here.
Every animal returned today will be fitted with a GPS tracking device that will allow researchers the ability to monitor their movements and ensure their acclimation to their natural habitat for the next year. These releases come at a critical time for the species as Florida manatees are at high risk from natural and human-caused threats.
“We pride ourselves on our nearly 50-year legacy to the rescue, rehabilitation, and return of manatees to save these beloved Florida icons who play a critical role in our ecosystem,” said Dr. Joseph Gaspard, Vice President of Zoological Operations at SeaWorld Orlando & Vice Chairman of the MRP. “While we are thrilled to lead this effort, it would not be made possible without close collaboration with our partners in the Manatee Rescue & Rehabilitation Partnership. This was truly a team effort among the zoological community to ensure the best care was provided to return these manatees back to their natural habitat.”
RELATED STORY: DeSantis Highlights Florida’s Successful Efforts to Protect Manatees
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The Florida Attorney General’s Office on Thursday, Dec. 11, filed a lawsuit against popular online gaming platform Roblox, accusing the company of failing to protect its millions of underage users from predatory adults who would “find, groom, and abuse children.”
“Roblox aggressively markets to young children, but fails to protect them from sexual predators,” Attorney General James Uthmeier said in a post to X. “As a father of three little ones and as Florida’s attorney general, my number one priority is simple: to protect our kids.”
The lawsuit claims Florida children have been talked into taking and sending sexual images of themselves and lists several recent incidences, including a 20-year-old California man arrested last month for having sexually explicit conversations with a Palm Coast child and asking for nude photos.
A Roblox spokesperson said the lawsuit “fundamentally misrepresents how Roblox works.”
“We have advanced safeguards that monitor our platform for harmful content and communications,” Roblox Chief Safety Officer Matt Kaufman said in a statement, adding that the company — currently the most downloaded game in the world — will be rolling out additional safeguards “beyond what is required by law and what other platforms do.”
Read Florida’s lawsuit against Roblox
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What is Roblox?
San Mateo, California-based Roblox, released in 2006, hosts millions of user-created games (or “experiences”) constructed with the platform’s built-in game engine. Any user can create a game and share it with others, and there are millions of games available of all types.
The game platform and most games are free to use, but some cost to play. There is also a thriving economy based on Robux, an in-game virtual currency used to purchase virtual items. Roblox offers a subscription service called Roblox Premium that provides access to more features and a monthly allowance of Roblox.
Voice chat is available, but only for users aged 13 or older with verified ages. Age ratings were introduced for games in 2022, and in 2023, 17+ games were permitted to include more graphic violence, romance, and drinking.
According to Roblox, as of 2020, the monthly playerbase included half of all American children under the age of 16.
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The 2026 football schedule for the Florida Gators has been set. Next year’s slate was unveiled Thursday night on SEC Network.
The most notable dates are Florida’s SEC opener on Sept. 19 — a Week 3 trip to Auburn, where the Gators haven’t played since 2011 — along with a road game at Texas on Oct. 17 and home games against Ole Miss (Sept. 26) and Oklahoma (Nov. 7).
Next season will mark the Sooners’ first-ever visit to Gainesville. The teams have previously played twice in the postseason, with the Gators defeating Oklahoma 24-14 in their first-ever meeting to win the 2008 national championship.
The Gators open the season in The Swamp on Sept. 5 against Florida Atlantic. UF’s other non-conference opponents will be Campbell (Sept. 12) and at Florida State (Nov. 28).
Florida is also hosting South Carolina (Oct. 10) and Vanderbilt (Nov. 21). The Gators haven’t played the Gamecocks or the Commodores since 2023.
UF takes on Georgia in Atlanta on Oct. 31 after the bye week. Florida’s other road games are Missouri (Oct. 3), Texas (Oct. 17) and Kentucky (Nov. 14).
The Gators will be led by first-year coach Jon Sumrall. He won the American Conference title with Tulane last week and has the Green Wave in the College Football Playoffs. They will have a rematch against Ole Miss on Dec. 20 in the first round after losing in Oxford, 45-10, on Sept. 20.
Sumrall was back in Gainesville this week to assemble his staff. So far, he has hired offensive coordinator Buster Faulkner, defensive coordinator Brade White and defensive line coach Gerald Chatman.
Date
Opponent
Location
Sept. 5
Florida Atlantic
Gainesville, Florida
Sept. 12
Campbell
Gainesville, Florida
Sept. 19
at Auburn
Auburn, Alabama
Sept. 26
Ole Miss
Gainesville, Florida
Oct. 3
at Missouri
Columbia, Missouri
Oct. 10
South Carolina
Gainesville, Florida
Oct. 17
at Texas
Austin, Texas
Oct. 24
Bye
Oct. 31
Georgia
Atlanta, Georgia
Nov. 7
Oklahoma
Gainesville, Florida
Nov. 14
at Kentucky
Lexington, Kentucky
Nov. 21
Vanderbilt
Gainesville, Florida
Nov. 28
at Florida State
Tallahassee, Florida
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A 5-4 start to Florida basketball’s national title defense is not what anyone had in mind — much less, the Gator Nation — but here we are nine games deep into the 2025-26 schedule.
To be fair, three of those losses have come against programs currently ranked among the top five in both major polls and have been off to stellar starts. The Arizona Wildcats, Duke Blue Devils and UConn Huskies are nothing to sneeze at, and while the TCU Horned Frogs are not quite on their tier, all of these losses came either on the road (Duke) or on a neutral court (the other three).
Maybe Todd Golden should reconsider playing in all of these early-season special events in the future. But alas, that is a story for another season.
ESPN thinks Florida has failed to meet expectations
Obviously, with a dominating frontcourt roster returning in full, there was plenty to be optimistic about heading into the campaign. However, the departure of three guards to the NBA and a fourth to the transfer portal has proven to be a void too large to fill with their offseason acquisitions.
And that is the crux of ESPN’s Myron Medcalf’s observation that the Gators have simply not met the bar so far.
“Months after winning a national title with an elite set of guards, Florida’s Todd Golden rebooted his backcourt with former Arkansas star Boogie Fland and Princeton transfer Xaivian Lee,” he begins.
“It hasn’t worked out as planned. In Florida’s two-player lineups — an on-court metric at EvanMiya.com that captures how teams perform when specific players are paired together — the Fland-Lee combination ranked 26th within its own team,” Metcalf continues.
“And though Lee scored 19 points against UConn in Tuesday’s game at Madison Square Garden, that loss was another example of the Gators’ limitations when Lee and Fland (1-for-9 combined from 3 against the Huskies) aren’t equally elite on the same night.”
He has not liked what he has seen, and his conclusion is not necessarily unfair.
“Ultimately, Florida hasn’t looked like a defending champion thus far, despite Thomas Haugh (18.6 PPG, 7.6 RPG, 2.8 APG) playing like an All-American.”
How does the NET, BPI and KenPom view Florida basketball?
While Medcalf’s assessment comes fully equipped with dark clouds, the objective metrics paint a much more optimistic outlook for the team overall.
According to the NET rankings, Florida is just inside the top 25 at No. 24 — one spot ahead of the Miami Hurricanes, who they beat in Jacksonville back in November. The Gators are 1-3 in Quadrant 1 matchups, 1-1 in Quad 2, 1-0 in Quad 3 and 2-0 in Quad 4.
KenPom views the Orange and Blue even more bullishly, ranking Florida at No. 15 despite the weak record. Golden’s gang currently sits at No. 15 with a plus-26.55 adjusted net rating — up from plus-25.70 (17th) at the end of November, while the offense (120.4) moved up from 24th to 23rd in the nation, and the defense (93.8) has only dropped one place — from 10th to 11th — despite allowing 0.6 fewer points per 100 possessions.
The most optimistic metric for Florida comes from ESPN’s Basketball Power Index, which has the Gators at No. 9 despite a 1-3 stretch over the past two weeks. They have an 18.8 overall BPI, with the offense logging in at 8.5 (22nd) and defense earning a 10.3 (8th) rating recently.
ESPN projects Florida to go 21.0-10.0 overall and 12.2-5.8 in conference play.
Follow us @GatorsWire on X, formerly known as Twitter, as well as Bluesky, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Florida Gators news, notes and opinions.
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