Gator Country

Florida head football coach Urban Meyer is ready for some real football, and so are his top-ranked Gators./Gator Country file photo by Tim Casey

Through all the workouts and practices this fall, the Sept. 5 season opener has crawled closer in Urban Meyer’s mind. His team needed the four weeks of practice to prepare, but there was always that fear of injury. Now his team is three days away from opening the season against Charleston Southern Saturday night in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium, and it couldn’t come soon enough.

“We’re ready to go and a lot of it is because of the health of our team,” Meyer said. “I kind of held my breath today. Let’s just get through today, but we did get better.”

Looking forward to the season opener isn’t a new feeling for Meyer, but it hasn’t always been that way. Back in 2007, the Florida roster was young and inexperienced after the 2006 national championship, the Gators having lost seniors and juniors to the NFL Draft. The depth chart was completely made over with young players, and some true freshmen even made the starting lineup.

But this season is different. Meyer can look across the practice field and see almost all of the same bodies from the 2008 national championship season.

“There are times where you have a real young team and you need another week of it,” Meyer said. “We’re good, though.”

Reality set in for Meyer Wednesday at practice. The feeling of game week is something cherished by the head coach, and it leaks through the rest of the program.

Meyer only expects the feelings of anticipation to increase throughout the football offices on Thursday.

“Thursdays are great,” Meyer said. “We have what’s called the best Fridays in football. Kids just talk about it. The game day around here is second to none.”

DEBOSE UPDATE: Meyer said immediately after practice that there is nothing to update on the status of freshman wide receiver Andre Debose. The Florida doctors continue to take their time in making a decision and will make a decision sometime soon.

Meyer confirmed that he met with Debose’s parents on Tuesday night, and the family agreed to wait before making a decision.

“We’re going to do a little more research,” Meyer said. “Other than that, there’s not much new.”

OTHER INJURIES UPDATED: Linebacker Brandon Hicks (ankle) practiced on Wednesday. Meyer said that defensive tackle Lawrence Marsh (ankle) practiced, but he was “a little gimpy.” Linebacker Brendan Beal did not practice because of a sore neck, but Meyer said that he is listed as probable for Saturday’s game.

Jelani Jenkins ran around some at practice on Wednesday, returning from a sprained ankle injury. Meyer still said that Jenkins is doubtful to play on Saturday. Carl Moore (back) and Jeremy Brown (back) both didn’t practice and won’t play on Saturday.

There is never a benefit to an injury, but Meyer does like the depth that he has behind Hicks and Marsh. Hicks was expected to start coming into the fall camp, but he has been passed by A.J. Jones.

“The good thing is there’s a little rotation at both spots because A.J. Jones is going to start at the SAM linebacker,” Meyer said. “He’s earned that spot. They’ll rotate a little bit at SAM.”

Meyer also mentioned Omar Hunter and Troy Epps as backing up Marsh, giving them a good rotation at the nose tackle spot.

Compared to where Florida was last season, the current injury list is nothing. After losing five players with torn knee ligaments in last year’s camp, Meyer knows that he is lucky to have his players in as good of health as they are.

“Don’t say that because you might jinx us,” Meyer said. “Last year at this time, it was a bad deal. This year we just have some minors.”

STARTING BATTLES: Meyer said last week that he thought he would be ready to announce the starting offensive line on Wednesday, but that is no longer the case. The battle is too close to call right now, and he expects that it could go all the way up until game time.

“We’re not ready to determine,” Meyer said. “That might be a game-time decision. It’s that close.”

The other key battle is at defensive tackle between Terron Sanders and Jaye Howard. Sanders started last season, but the late emergence of Howard saw him pushing for playing time at the end of the season. With added weight in the off-season, Howard is now pushing to start.

“Real close,” Meyer said. “I’m not even sure who is going to start. That’s Coach Mac’s (Dan McCarney) call. Jaye has come a long way, and it’s good to have two guys go.”

IMPROVED CORNERBACK: Senior Markihe Anderson has had a tremendous camp and has proven to Meyer that he deserves playing time. Anderson saw the field during the 2006 season as a freshman but fell down the depth chart with the emergence of younger starters Joe Haden and Janoris Jenkins.

“He’s right in the mix,” Meyer said. “He’ll be involved much more than he was a year ago. He’s done a very nice job.”

Meyer has seen a player who hasn’t backed down from the challenge, knowing he has two younger players cemented in their starting positions.

“I’ve seen a guy who hasn’t accepted his role, and he’s going after playing time,” Meyer said. “If you said give me the five most improved, he’s one of them.”

IMPORTANCE OF TRACK: Meyer has always been a fan of his players running track in the spring. His fascination with speed has been well documented since he took the job as the head coach at Florida, and it remains no different today. His love for speed actually started when he studied it as an assistant football coach at Colorado State.

“I love track,” Meyer said. “I love that coaches get paid to study speed, research speed and all of that. We started that 20 years ago at Colorado State before anybody else really did it. We had our track coach come over and I was a receiver coach. I listened and I learned a lot about speed training. I strongly encourage them, I just don’t want to waste (track coach Mike Holloway’s) time. He’s a busy man. To have guys over there that don’t score points, that’s a waste of time. I love when guys run track.”

It does take a toll on the players who go from a long football season over to run track after the bowl game.

“It’s hard on their bodies,” Meyer said. “After bowl games, their bodies feel terrible. Here’s Jeff Demps or Percy (Harvin) or whoever, and they’re just blown out. You say, ‘Hey are you going to run track?’ They look at me and say, ‘What, are you kidding me? I want to go sleep and let my body heal.’”

Even though Debose’s hamstring injury came during his senior year at Seminole High School in Seminole, Meyer said he won’t discourage incoming recruits from running track. In fact, if his incoming players aren’t running track, Meyer gets a little worried.

“You’ve got to run track,” Meyer said. “I get worried about the ones that don’t. The fast guys run track. The fast guys that aren’t but say they’re fast, don’t run track. I didn’t run track.”

About the author

GatorCody

Cody, born and raised in Daytona Beach, is a baseball fanatic, but loves covering Gator recruiting for Gator Country. He graduated from Spruce Creek High's prestigious International Baccalaureate program and is now in his sophomore year studying journalism at the University of Florida.

More Football | RSS