The Croak at Doak

TALLAHASSEE – When he looks back someday on the tape of the game played here on Nov. 27, 2010, Urban Meyer will see what his eyes refuse to believe right now: That this was the night that his Florida team hit pretty close to rock bottom.

Not a personal rock bottom, mind you, because he had reached that in December of last year after being hospitalized with chest pains and stricken with fear that he might be dying. Survival is one thing. Advancement is quite another. These Florida Gators fell backwards again Saturday. Way back.

Call it what you will – he indignantly refused to let a reporter put the words “Ground Zero” in his mouth – but as soon as he walked into the press conference, Meyer’s opening remarks indicated he knew what needed to be done.

Something has to die after a game like that and, aside from the memory of such a painful spanking, Meyer is hoping that he can bury the past and start anew for whatever bowl game awaits. Gator fans are hoping maybe it will be the three-quarterback system and the helter-skelter offense that accompanies it — not to mention a coach or two.

Meyer declined to address solutions, saying on that there was “a chance” he might go away from three quarterbacks, admitting a serious deficiency and announcing intentions to go hard after some new blood.

“I can assure we are going to rebuild this thing and build it up the right way, and do it right,” he said, not even waiting for the heat to come.

When a football team digs itself a hole and then piles dirt on itself as these Gators did, there’s nothing left to do but add the grave marker, then move on. And so on Bobby Bowden Field, where the last time Florida had lost, Saddam Hussein had just been captured and Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected in his first term as California governor, the Plan to Win was officially announced as deceased.

If they looked like a team without a plan, they were.

There are so many questions after the FSU loss about the regression, aside from the obvious ones about the offense, the coaches and the game plan. Like the killer turnovers. Like why Florida already had eight penalties in the first quarter and half – which is how many they usually average per game. And like how Deonte Thompson could have a record performance last weekend and didn’t get a whiff of a pass against the Seminoles. And why the Gator defense made Christian Ponder look like the second coming of Joe Montana.

Florida has now lost five of its last eight games – the first time since 1988 for that many losses. Worst yet, this once proud program has clearly slipped several notches in the blink of an eye. And answers are not forthcoming at the moment as to why, although Meyer did admit that change was under consideration.

“I didn’t believe we’d be down that far,” Meyer admitted, “but we are.”

This team was miscast and never really established the offensive identity it was seeking.

“We had a vision of being ‘the fastest team in America’ and you’re not looking at the fastest team in America right now,” Meyer said.

How do you rebuild it? “Tough ass players,” Meyer said. “And tough ass coaches.”

And, of course, new talent.

Meyer said that would begin right away, because he and his staff would “recruit our butts off.”

* * *

This 2010 campaign of coaching purgatory has Urban sort of stuck between a football hell and a mirage of expectations never realized. The Plan to Win has melted into a Hope to Win, but those hopes dwindled as the season wound down and finally just dissipated on Bobby Bowden Field.

Meyer acknowledged that failure, along with his own shortcomings in managing and coaching the game.

It’s bad enough that Florida State beat the turkey stuffing out the Gators, 31-7, in the most lopsided loss to the Seminoles since 2000 (30-7). Frankly after five minutes of the second quarter, Florida played like it was “The Joke at Doak.”

Self-inflicted wounds from an inept performance denied the Gators of any chance, starting with a Chris Rainey fumble which helped erase a brief 7-3 Florida lead. Then the plague unfolded. And not even the old standby fake punt worked.

* * *

You know it’s not your day when you pull out you’re “A” material and it’s not good enough.

On fourth and five, Chas Henry took off running with three blockers ahead and none of them could apparently see the FSU safety, Ochuko Jenjie, who stopped the Florida punter a yard short of the sticks, thus ending Meyer’s streak of eight straight successful fake punts.

“We needed a touchdown, not a field goal,” Meyer explained. “I was trying to make something happen. And it didn’t happen.”

After that, it all fell apart. The Florida defense looked like a big bird on platter for Thanksgiving, as Seminole quarterback Ponder carved them up for three touchdown passes.

You might say the UF offense provided the desert, coughing up four turnovers.

That such a terrible showing was made by such a group of promising young athletes and a bunch of coaches with a championship pedigree makes it’s pretty tough to defend any coaches or players or system.

So one wonders: If back-to-back recruiting bonanzas don’t fill in the blanks and achieve the desired result, how can more good players really alter the landscape – unless the landscape architects change?

* * *

Yeah, I know, you want answers: What about the three-quarterback system? How about changes in the coaching staff? Why did you remove Jordan Reid when he was moving the team?

The reality is that the offense is mired in mediocrity and the three-quarterback system, for whatever reason, seems to breed a lack of confidence and a void leadership that shows up in discombobulation.

The trouble began in the first game with mishandled snaps and concluded with a lack of consistency in Doak Campbell Stadium after a brief flurry of offensive success with the overtime with against Georgia.

Though the common characteristic of Urban Meyer’s teams has always been to improve as the season progresses, clearly this wasn’t the case in 2010.

The only thing Meyer had to hang his hat on in 2010 was his record of 16-1 against Florida’s so-called rivals. Even in an off year, a win over FSU would have salvaged some measure of dignity with wins over the ‘Noles, Tennessee and Georgia. Instead, Meyer’s sixth campaign at Florida ended with his worst record (7-5), and one of his worst beatings as a coach.

Bowden wasn’t there to celebrate it, but on the field named after the old coach, Jimbo Fisher began his new era by putting stamp on the FSU program with only the 20th victory in FSU history and Meyer’s first loss to the School Out West. If this becomes an emerging trend, that doesn’t bode well for the Gator program.

If nothing else, this game proved to be a referendum on three three-quarterback system because the offense never got into sync. The results are in, and it’s not working.

On the best looking Florida drive of the game, as Jordan Reed took the snaps kept on the ground for large chunks of double-digit yardage, the coaches inserted John Brantley into the game on second down and 8 and the red-shirt junior promptly threw to the wrong-colored jersey (Mike Harris).

Asked if he thought putting Brantley in the game on mainly just passing downs was fair to him, after saying that wasn’t always the case, Meyer confessed: “Probably not.” And then explained this whole quarterback conundrum was the result of just trying to find a way to move the ball.

Now there is this other purgatory to which Meyer referred to several times, “immediacy and future.” The “immediacy” has to do with figuring out how to reconstruct an offense, coaching up the younger players who will be next season’s replacements and sending the seniors off with a bowl victory.

One would surmise that the “future” entails everything else, such as possible coaching staff changes, who will be next year’s quarterback –- and how many other of them there will be.

* * *

As the old saying goes, “Rock bottom is a good place to start.” Because you can only go up from here.

Certainly Meyer has proven he is a skilled head coach and that he has a knack for finding top-notched assistant coaches. Right now, though, the magic is missing.

Whether this game becomes a crucible that brings about change for the better, or reverses the trend that Meyer has set by dominating his rivals remains to be seen.

If nothing else, this will add fuel to the fire as a referendum for change, much in the way the Tea Party impacted the recent elections. And we all know what happened there.