Wins and losses from Florida Gators week 4 loss

Well, what a tale of two halves that was. After Florida’s atrocious showing in the 38-28 loss to Tennessee, I’m sure most of you are still playing all the possible scenarios that could’ve changed the entire game through your heads just like me. Until next year comes around, thoughts of this game will probably continue to race through my mind at random times and take me back to that very dark place.

If I’m being honest, I’m sitting in a dark room right now as I write this just soaking up the pain of thinking back to the game. Spoiler Alert: There are a lot of losses. For obvious reasons, I will be dividing the takeaways from this game into halves.

First Half (Wins)

Besides the miscues by Antonio Callaway on special teams, the first half was as close as one could hope to being flawless. There was energy, the offense looked comfortable with Austin Appleby taking over at quarterback, and the defense was lights out.

The Florida Gators had seven explosive plays on offense in the first half. Appleby went above and beyond what was expected of him and Jordan Scarlett was flat out dragging bodies with him every single run. It was awesome. Florida had 402 yards of offense in the game, 300 of those yards came in the first half.

The defense had a few struggles in the first half, but came up big in the red zone when it really mattered. If you are looking for every positive you can find to hang onto from the game, just remember Florida’s stop at the goal line after Callaway’s muffed punt, or Quincy Wilson’s beautiful interception in the endzone (even though he is apparently the sole reason Florida lost the game? Okay.). Josh Dobbs was just 7-for-21 passing and Florida held Tennessee to just 162 yards of offense in the first half.

That’s about all I have to say about that, there are no true wins when the Gators lose to Tennessee.

Second Half (Losses)

This is an easy one. The second half of the game was an absolute nightmare. It feels like the nightmare still hasn’t ended. It was like the team went back two years in time to a terribly predictable offense and a defense that was too gassed to stop the bleeding.

LOSS #1: Absolutely terrible play calling.

Are we completely sure Will Muschamp’s staff didn’t make a return to call offensive plays and sabotage the game? There was no reason to go away from the game plan from the first half. It was working perfectly. There is more than one single reason why the game was lost, but play calling is the biggest. It’s not hard to defend when every possession is run, run, short pass.

Appleby, as mentioned before, did everything that could’ve possibly been asked of him in this game. He threw one interception, and that wasn’t pretty, but besides that he managed the game well. By the time the play calling finally changed back to giving Appleby some freedom mid-way through the fourth quarter, it was too late. It was understandable to go a little more conservative with a three score lead going into the second half, but after several three-and-outs in a row and Tennessee obviously finding a rhythm on offense, something should have been changed. Things weren’t just magically going to get better from there. While play calling was terrible, I am not going off the deep end and calling for coaches’ heads. It just needs to be changed, and it needs to happen soon.

LOSS #2: Tennessee bullied the offensive line in the second half

The offensive line was pushed around in the second half. With the Gators making conservative play calls, the offensive line needed to get a push to help the run game be effective. Appleby had close to no time on the few passes he did throw before the one decent drive in the second half, and he was sacked twice.

Not only the offensive line, but the entire team came out with no sense of urgency in the second half. It was like when they went into the locker room, they had a team talk and said “lets completely lose all of our fire and intensity when we go back out there”. Of course, that didn’t actually happen, but that’s just how it felt. As far as the offensive line goes, they were relatively decent in the first half, but play in the second half was unacceptable. Again, consistency is key with them and they still have not found it after four games this season.

LOSS #3: Missed tackles and blown coverages by the defense

The defense was forced to be on the field a majority of the time in the second half, so there is no doubt they were gassed. The defense is good, but putting all of the pressure to win the game on them was never a good plan. Tennessee was the best offense they had seen all year. It was going to be almost impossible to keep them in check the entire game.

With that being said, there are still no excuses for all of the missed tackles and blown coverages in the secondary. Florida’s defense just does not give up 38 unanswered points. I didn’t think it was possible. The Gators struggled with missed tackles against the Vols last year, so that had been a huge focus all week coming into the game. There is such a thing as being too aggressive on defense, and that is exactly what happened. There has to be controlled aggressiveness.

Duke Dawson, I wish somebody could tell me what Duke Dawson was doing. He has put together a pretty good season so far, but Saturday was not one of his finer moments. He was getting beat left and right and allowed several big plays to take place. The Jalen Tabor fall on the 67-yard touchdown pass to give Tennessee the lead perfectly depicted Florida’s entire second half. Sometimes it is inevitable to get tripped up, but that couldn’t have happened at a worse time for Tabor. With the way the game was being played, there was no recovering from it.

LOSS #4: Special teams, penalties, and penalties on special teams

I split this up into halves, but special teams was the one thing that was atrocious throughout the entire game. Antonio Callaway was the man on offense in the first half, but he looked lost on punt returns. It’s like no one has ever told him to stick his heels on the 10-yard line and go back no further than that. After the first time (which led to a muffed punt) maybe it is okay to just have a talk with him about it and get things straightened out. After watching it happen for a second time, his day back there should have been done. One thing the Gators take pride in is winning the field position battle, and they were FAR from winning it against Tennessee. It’s very hard to get a good drive started from your own 1-yard line.

Penalties are still a problem haunting Florida every single game. It has been something listed as a loss every single week this season, and as I said would happen, Tennessee was the one team the Gators have faced that could (and did) take advantage of the free yards they were given. Florida had nine penalties for 75 yards in the game. Four of those penalties came on special teams. It was just an all-around bad day for the special teams unit.

Looking ahead, how the team responds in the coming weeks will determine a lot about their character and the amount of success this team is capable of having. The Tennessee game proved there is still a great deal of work to be done.

Bailiegh Carlton
A lifelong sports fan, Bailiegh Carlton knew from a young age that she wanted to work in sports in some capacity. Before transferring to the University of Florida to study journalism, she played softball at Gulf Coast State College. She then interned for Gator Country for three years as she worked toward her degree. After graduation, Bailiegh decided to explore other opportunities in the world of sports, but all roads led her right back here. In her time away, she and her husband welcomed a beautiful baby girl into the world. When she isn't working, she can almost always be found snuggled up with sweet baby Ridley, Cody and her four fur babies.

2 COMMENTS

  1. Good stuff Mr. williams…

    One thing that has always haunted coaches and programs (and fans) is the coaches stubbornness and egos. Zook was gonna do it his way no matter what! Muschamp was determined to do it his way and practically ruined our program in the process. Obviously, the second half play-calling was pretty horrific up in Knoxville.

    What I don’t see very often are coaches listening to the noise until it’s too late. They should have at least one staff member scanning social media, the news and getting some objective feedback to make adjustments. Hey, they’re paid the big bucks to do what they do. They should do more, IMHO to objectively analyse their progress. Coaches are usually defensive (understandably) and do the opposite of what they expect their player to do after a loss.

    As the saying goes…when would now be a good time to look at some things. That being said, sometime you simply get outcoached and outplayed by the better team.

    Go Gators.