Count Gary Danielson among Florida Gators naysayers

Tuesday night sophomore offensive tackle Fred Johnson made an off hand remark about the perception of the Florida Gators.

“I mean, we were the underdog in what, every game we played this year? Even with North Texas,” he said.

While that statement may not be true, the Gators were a 35 point favorite over North Texas, Johnson is right that the Gators don’t have many believers outside their own locker room.

Count CBS analyst Gary Danielson as one of them.

Speaking during a teleconference prior to the SEC Championship game Danielson took the stance that the SEC is Alabama and everyone else. The No. 1 Crimson Tide are 12-0, have been the No. 1 team all season long and have rolled over its opponents this season.

“I really think in my 11 years of doing the SEC, this is the weakest SEC that I’ve seen,” Danielson said. “There’s really not a team to challenge them.”

Alabama is currently a 24-point favorite over the Gators. That line makes Alabama the biggest favorite in SEC Championship Game history, matching the Gators who were 24-point favorites over Arkansas in 1995 (Florida won that game 34-3).

Alabama owns the nation’s longest winning streak at 24 games. It’s the third longest streak in Alabama history and the longest under Nick Saban. The Crimson Tide is also outscoring opponents by an average of 28 points per game. If you took Alabama’s total points (473), subtracted the points they’ve allowed (137), the Tide still would have outscored the Gators this season, 336-to-265.

This game, on paper, looks to be as big of a mismatch as Alabama’s opponent on November 19, Chattanooga (Bama won 31-3). Alabama has been so good this season that it’s hard to even get up to play the best team in the country. They’ve sucked the life out of teams before the pregame coin flip.

“I don’t think it’s as dramatic a game as we’ve had, we’ve experienced before. I don’t think there’s a lot of people that watch college football that believe that Florida has a chance to beat them,” Danielson said. “After watching last year’s game, the combination of the two probably. We could see it almost in the Iron Bowl (between Alabama and Auburn last weekend). It did not have the intensity that we we’re normally used to. You could feel the stadium was not as electric as usual.”

Florida’s perception problem comes from their offense, and offense that Jim McElwain was supposed to fix when he came to Gainesville from Colorado State. Florida was held to a season-low 207 yards. It was the fifth-consecutive game the Gators have failed to post 400 yards of offense. Through six games the Gators averaged 426.5 yards-per-game, since then just 264.2 in five games. On Monday McElwain was pressed as to why the offense was struggling, that he was brought here to ensure it wouldn’t. The coach shot back that he was brought to Gainesville to go to Atlanta, something he’s done each season he’s been in Gainesville.

“It seems like Coach Mac is having the same struggles that Will Muschamp has had, just can’t seem to find the quarterback play significant enough to handle the tough defenses in the SEC and that’s really that story line for the SEC the last few years, last year and this year especially,” said Danielson. “If you don’t have top-notch quarterback play, you have a tough time moving against these elite athletes on defense especially.”
And the Crimson Tide will bring NFL talent to the field this Saturday. Bama has allowed opponents into the redzone just 18 times this season. The Crimson Tide have the nation’s best total (246.8), rushing (66.67) and scoring defense (11.4) this season as well.
The Gators have struggled with consistency this season on the offensive side of the ball, especially the last month of the season and they face the nastiest defense in the country this week.

Last year Antonio Callaway was able to get the Gators on the board with an 85-yard punt return and C.J. Worton made an incredible touchdown catch in garbage time to pull Florida to within 15 points. Alabama is the best team in the country but they’re not infallible. Danielson just doesn’t believe the Gators have the horses to push Alabama to the brink.

“Antonio Callaway is a good receiver, but there’s no Julio Jones running around there or A.J. Green. Nobody that the defenses have to gameplan to stop,” said Danielson. “Since Percy Harvin left Florida, I don’t think they’ve had that guy where the defensive coaches around the league start their game plan on Sunday and Monday to say how do we control this guy? So a little bit of drop-off on the specialists on offense — not so much at running back but more at the receiver spot.”

Alabama’s weakest link, if there truly is one, has been as a pass defense. The cornerbacks have been suspect at times but the Tide still come in with the nation’s 11th best pass defense. However, as Danielson points out, the Gators haven’t given any reason for confidence as far as a passing attack. If Florida wants to win football games they need to run the football. Bama has given up 100 rushing yards just twice (Ole Miss, Texas A&M) this season and a Florida group that could be without as many as 12 players this season will struggle to move the ball against Alabama.

Nick de la Torre
A South Florida native, Nick developed a passion for all things sports at a very young age. His love for baseball was solidified when he saw Al Leiter’s no-hitter for the Marlins live in May of 1996. He was able to play baseball in college but quickly realized there isn’t much of a market for short, slow outfielders that hit around the Mendoza line. Wanting to continue with sports in some capacity he studied journalism at the University of Central Florida. Nick got his first start in the business as an intern for a website covering all things related to the NFL draft before spending two seasons covering the Florida football team at Bleacher Report. That job led him to GatorCountry. When he isn’t covering Gator sports, Nick enjoys hitting way too many shots on the golf course, attempting to keep up with his favorite t.v. shows and watching the Heat, Dolphins and Marlins. Follow him on twitter @NickdelatorreGC