Welcome to game week! The No. 13 Gators will open the 2021 season on Saturday at 7:30 against Florida Atlantic in the Swamp.
Before we look ahead to the game, it’s time to recap the final week of training camp.
Here are my five thoughts on the week that was.
1. I can’t believe the season is already here.
I don’t know about you, but this offseason seemed to fly by way faster than any other one I can remember. Usually, by the time the calendar flips to July, I’m starving for football, and the days seem to pass at a snail’s pace. The moment when toe finally meets leather is the culmination of several months’ worth of anticipation.
Instead, a week or two ago, I looked at the calendar and thought, “Oh, my gosh. The season really starts in a couple of weeks?”. This season has crept up on me.
I think a large reason for that is because of how bizarre last year was. The season didn’t begin until late September, and all of the uncertainty surrounding COVID testing and crowd sizes and whether every conference would play made every day of the offseason feel like a week.
Plus, there hadn’t been any sports in America since March, save for some crowd-less MLB games. So, there was literally nothing else to do except sit around and stress out over whether there would be a college football season.
Now that everything is back on a normal schedule, this year seems to be moving along exponentially faster than last year.
Not that I’m complaining, though. I can’t wait to be in the Swamp on Saturday night.
2. Kamar Wilcoxson’s injury hurts the Gators’ depth in the secondary.
Wilcoxson tweeted a message on Saturday that indicates that he suffered an injury that will keep him sidelined for a while. Dan Mullen hadn’t commented on the injury as of the time this article was written, but early reports indicate that he could miss more than half of the season.
https://twitter.com/KamarWilcoxson4/status/1431660571749986307?s=20
If that’s true, that’s a bigger blow to the secondary than losing Jaydon Hill to a torn ACL. They have enough options at corner to overcome a major injury like that, but they’re thin at STAR and safety.
Wilcoxson played both of those spots, so this is almost like a double whammy. It’s going to create a trickle-down effect on the entire secondary. If something were to happen to starting STAR Tre’Vez Johnson, they’d either have to play Diwun Black at the position full time despite being more of a tweener between safety and linebacker or move a corner inside. Of course, that latter option would thin out the depth at corner.
They probably don’t have the luxury of moving Johnson back to safety if Trey Dean or Rashad Torrence were to get injured anymore. Instead, they’d likely have to plug a freshman with limited to no experience into the starting lineup.
UF might’ve also had some packages with Johnson and Wilcoxson on the field at the same time that will have to be scratched until later in the season.
It’s not time to panic just yet, but they’re potentially one more injury away from having a difficult time putting a competent secondary on the field.
3. I expect Anthony Richardson to have a larger role this season than Emory Jones did the last two years.
First, while Jones might prove to be a terrific starting quarterback, he almost certainly won’t be as good of a passer as Kyle Trask. That alone should allow Richardson to carve out a larger role than Jones did the past two seasons. It won’t be as difficult of a decision to pull Jones out of the game for a few plays.
But I also think Richardson will fit into the flow of the game better than Jones did. Jones and Trask couldn’t be any more different. Trask is a deadly accurate gunslinger who needs a sundial to time his 40-yard dash. Jones is a supreme athlete with a cannon for an arm who doesn’t always throw accurately or make smart decisions.
So, it often felt like Jones entering the game killed the offense’s rhythm the past two years. They had to run completely different sets of plays depending on who was taking the snap.
Jones and Richardson are way more interchangeable. They can pretty much run all of the same plays; one of them just might do certain things a little better than the other. It should be a much smoother transition between the two of them this season. Richardson should also be a weapon in the red zone. He can use his 236-pound body to plow through defenders in a way that few players on this roster can.
I expect Richardson to be an integral part of the offense and not just somebody Mullen throws out there to gain experience for the future.
4. If the defense doesn’t improve its communication issues, it certainly won’t be because of a lack of effort.
Secondary coach Wesley McGriff told the media last week that he makes the STARs and safeties yell out their calls and make their hand signals in the meeting room the same way that they would on the field. He’s stressing the importance of continuing to communicate until the person you’re talking to acknowledges that they’ve received the message.
Johnson said McGriff even makes them communicate every small thing that they do. Need to use the restroom? You’ll need to make the appropriate sign and get your teammates to sign back.
That might sound a little corny, but it’s worth a shot after the plethora of communication errors we saw last season. You have to know what the heck you’re doing before the coaches can worry about teaching you how to do it.
McGriff and cornerbacks coach Jules Montinar have tried to make overcommunicating a habit with their players. Will it stick, or will the players revert to their previous habits once the games begin and the coaches aren’t in their ears on every play?
5. There seems to be an increased excitement for this season opener compared to other years in the recent past.
UF has almost sold out its tickets for the Florida Atlantic game. Student season tickets are sold out for the first time in a few years.
A couple of years ago, a game against Florida Atlantic would’ve probably had about 10,000 empty seats and made for some embarrassing shots on the television broadcast.
Of course, just because the tickets are sold doesn’t mean the ticket holders will show up – looking at you, students – but I think this will be one of the most-attended season openers since the end of the Urban Meyer era.
That excitement likely comes from only having about 17,000 fans in the Swamp for games last year with a strict mask requirement, no tailgating and no Gator Walk. Those things probably became taken for granted. “I can always go to a game next year” probably became the thought process for some fans.
That won’t be the case anymore. Suddenly, all of the minor inconveniences associated with attending a game – bumper-to-bumper traffic down two-lane roads, walking half a mile to the stadium, the sweltering heat, hard aluminum bleachers and $5 sodas – don’t seem so bad anymore.
There will probably be people at this game who may not regularly attend football games simply because there’s no guarantee that there will be another chance.
This isn’t just another football game. It’s a Gator Nation reunion.