With about three minutes left to play in the second quarter at TIAA Bank Field, the Gators were sitting in a decent spot against No. 1 Georgia. They were only trailing 3-0, and safety Rashad Torrence had just intercepted Stetson Bennett to give them possession, albeit backed up at their own 1.
All they needed to do was pick up a first down or two, run out the clock and make some offensive adjustments at halftime to give themselves a chance at the upset.
Instead, things spiraled out of control quickly. When the two teams finally jogged to their locker rooms for halftime, the Bulldogs led 24-0. Georgia cruised to a 34-7 win from there. It was Georgia’s fourth win over Florida in the last five meetings, and the Gators slipped to 2-7 in their last nine games against Power Five competition.
“Looking at us right now, we’re not where we want to be,” UF coach Dan Mullen said. “Obviously, [we’re] certainly not where we want to be through this point of the season. Our players certainly are not where we want to be at this point in the season. It’s a mindset right now that we’ve got to go change and we’ve got to fix. Football’s a great team sport, the ultimate team sport, and, as the head coach, the mindset of the team falls on me and where we’re at [with] the attitude, the approach, and everything falls on me.
“In this final third of the season, that’s on me to get this fixed, and the approach that I take and the mindset that we play with, that’s on me to get it fixed. I certainly plan on doing that, of changing this, where we’re at right now with us and creating some positive energy for us and some confidence for us and the expectations to feed off of each other. I’m going to work, and I’m going to make sure I get that right.”
The onslaught started when UF quarterback Anthony Richardson, making his first career start, carried the ball up the middle on second-and-10 from the 1. He met a sea of defenders a few yards down the field and kept his feet moving to fight for extra yards. Just before he finally hit the ground at the 10-yard line, UGA linebacker Nolan Smith ripped the ball out of his hands.
On the very next snap, James Cook made quick work of UF’s defense for an 11-yard touchdown run.
Two plays later, Richardson tried to fit a pass into a tight window to Xzavier Henderson over the middle of the field. Defensive lineman Travon Walker deflected the ball, and Smith intercepted it at the Florida 36.
Bennett immediately connected with Kearis Jackson for a touchdown pass.
After the Gators (4-4, 2-4 SEC) moved the ball to near midfield with 17 seconds left, Richardson stared down a receiver and threw a pick-six to linebacker Nakobe Dean.
In the span of a few minutes, Gators fans went from feeling optimistic about their chances in the second half to being completely demoralized.
“I feel like we shot ourselves in the foot too many times to overcome,” running back Dameon Pierce said. “We just really gave it to the defense, honestly, man. But hats off to them, they’re a great team; we already knew that coming in. We had the perfect game plan; we just didn’t execute on our end.”
If you didn’t watch the game and only looked at the postgame stats, you could see why Georgia (8-0, 6-0) won the game, but you’d have a hard time understanding how Georgia won by 27 points. Florida outgained them (355-354), picked up more first downs (20-18) and played them even in turnovers (3-3).
Well, the Gators ran 22 more plays than the Bulldogs did, so Georgia actually averaged two yards more per play.
But beyond that, the difference is that Georgia played what coaches often refer to as “complementary football.” Each time that their defense created a turnover, their offense scored a touchdown on the very next play. When their offense put their defense in bad spots with turnovers, their defense responded by shutting down Florida anyway.
Meanwhile, the Gators’ offense didn’t take advantage of the opportunities that the defense gave them, and the defense played poorly in sudden change situations.
That’s been a recurring theme throughout the season. The Gators have outgained all eight of their opponents, but instead of being undefeated and fighting for a playoff berth, they’ll enter November still needing a couple of more wins to become bowl eligible.
While stats obviously aren’t as important as the final score, the team that gains more yards tends to win the game as a general rule. So, for the Gators to have lost four games this season in which they’ve outgained their opponent is frustrating. They just don’t make the handful of plays necessary to win the game, or, in Saturday’s case, the handful of plays necessary to have a chance to win the game.
Torrence, who added another interception and a fumble recovery later in the game, said that the defense needs to pick up the offense better in those situations.
“We know if the offense makes a mistake, we’ve got to go on the field and play defense at the end of the day, whether they get it at the 20 and got to drive 80 or they get it at the 10 and only got to drive 10 yards,” he said. “We’ve just got to play defense.”
Mullen said that good teams build off of their successes and pick each other up after failures the way that Georgia did. He said that his team needs a mindset adjustment, and it’s his responsibility as the head coach to implement it.
“When the defense is playing great, [the] offense has got to respond,” he said. “We’ve got to score some points early. Defense kind of shutting them down early; we’ve got to get some points on the board when our defense is playing great and play team football. And, when the offense makes critical errors, turns the ball over, the defense has got to step up and just can’t give up an inch in those scenarios.
“That’s all of us working together and coming together and the whole team mindset, the team attitude that I know we can accomplish, but I know at times we want to look around, and it can’t be when something negative happens, ‘Oh, no.’ It’s got to be if something negative happens, it’s going to be, ‘I’ve got your back. I’m going to make this play, and I’m going to make sure I’m going to be the one to stomp it out at this point.’”
Mullen broke out his “don’t let go of the rope” analogy that he used frequently early in his tenure to further describe the mentality that he’s looking for. One of the Gators’ offseason workouts is essentially a giant game of tug of war where the players cannot let go of the rope no matter how much they might be hurting. Aside from improving their physical strength, the hope is that players will become mentally stronger from this exercise as well.
When adversity strikes during games, they cannot just kill over and let their opponents steamroll them the way that they did against Georgia.
“A negative attitude or dropping the rope certainly doesn’t fix anything,” Mullen said. “Grasping the rope does, and holding on tight does, and squeezing as [your hands are] burning does. And I will say something about me: I don’t drop the rope. I’m not going to let you even rip it out of my hand. You can drag me around by my face if you want, but I’m going to squeeze it and not let it go. I’m not going to let any inch of that rope go, and I know our players won’t either, OK, but I’m going to tell you that’s what we have to do.
“We can’t let negativity creep in. I see our team excited, and even meeting with the guys, we’ll see on Monday morning, but I’m pretty optimistic about the challenge that’s about to be ahead of us the rest of the season.”
The rest of Gator Nation’s collective optimism was ripped out of Richardson’s hands with about two minutes to go in the first half.
The Gators didn’t respond well to adversity against Georgia, and now the external noise is going to ratchet up even more.
Torrence is confident that they will respond correctly and finish this season as well as possible.
“I know there is a lot of outside, maybe even some inside heads down, but we as a team are going to play football,” he said. “As many games as you are going to give us is as many games we are going to play.
“At this point, we can’t separate as a team. We have to all come together and not throw this season away. We’ve still got games to play, so there’s no need for anybody at all to think that this season is over with.”