Importance of Friday Night Lights

Friday Night Lights has been an important football camp for the Florida Gators and the coaching staff ever since Will Muschamp and company arrived in Gainesville.

Over the last two years, the coaching staff has seen a majority of the high school players that sign with Florida either attend Friday Night Lights, or attend a summer camp in June in Gainesville.

Last year, of the 26 high school players that signed with the Gators, 15 attended Friday Night lights and six others attended a summer camp in June at Florida.

In total, that means 21 players were in Gainesville showing off their skills for the coaching staff last summer in Gainesville.

The 2012 class had 21 high school players sign with Florida, 13 of those players were in attendance at Friday Night Lights that year.

Four other high school players in the 2012 class also attended a session of Will Muschamp’s football camp in June of that year.

So over the last two recruiting cycles that Will Muschamp has had, a total 38 of the 47 high school players attended either a football camp or Friday Night Lights in Gainesville.

A lot of the reason behind this is A.) the coaches are able to see the prospect workout and B.) it’s more one on one time with the players and coaches during big events like these.

These events are critical to out of state prospects who the staff may be on the fence about, because they are not able to watch those players as much as the instate prospects.

Stay with GatorCountry.com as we will have complete coverage of everything happening leading up to Friday Night Lights this week.

Andrew Spivey
Andrew always knew he wanted to be involved with sports in some capacity. He began by coaching high school football for six years before deciding to pursue a career in journalism. While coaching, he was a part of two state semifinal teams in the state of Alabama. Given his past coaching experience, he figured covering recruiting would be a perfect fit. He began his career as an intern for Rivals.com, covering University of Florida football recruiting. After interning with Rivals for six months, he joined the Gator Country family as a recruiting analyst. Andrew enjoys spending his free time on the golf course and watching his beloved Atlanta Braves. Follow him on Twitter at @AndrewSpiveyGC.