The quarterback controversy among fans and the media is only going to intensify this week.
Starter Emory Jones threw a pair of ugly interceptions in the second half of Florida’s 42-20 win over South Florida on Saturday. He made several more poor decisions that nearly led to additional turnovers.
Meanwhile, Anthony Richardson accounted for 267 of the Gators’ 666 yards. That’s 40.1 percent of the total offensive output. He threw touchdown passes of 75 and 41 yards to Jacob Copeland, ran for an 80-yard touchdown and threw a dime to Copeland while running to his left for 36 yards. He finished with more passing yards than Jones (152-151) on 19 fewer attempts.
Richardson became the first FBS player in the last 25 seasons to rush for more than 100 yards, pass for more than 150 yards yards and complete every pass he threw.
And he did all of that on just three passes and four runs.
With each big play that Richardson made and every mistake that Jones committed, you could feel the excitement and energy growing for Richardson within the fan base. If you were to conduct a poll of all Gators fans, 99 percent of them would likely vote in favor of Richardson taking over the starting role.
He’s a fan favorite, so much so that Jones got booed by the large UF contingent in the stands when he ran onto the field for a drive in the second half.
However, as he did after the Florida Atlantic game last week, coach Dan Mullen once again reiterated that Jones is his starting quarterback and that Richardson still has considerable room for improvement.
“We’re pretty fortunate; we have two quarterbacks right now that can make great plays out there on the field, play both of them,” Mullen said. “Both of them I thought were pretty efficient in the first half. Both of them were so-so at times with different situations in the second half with things that go on. It’s a long season, and we have young quarterbacks that I’ve got to continue to grow and continue to develop into being really good football players.”
Jones’ day started off very well. He completed nine of his 10 passes for 114 yards in the first half, including a beautifully thrown 35-yard scoring strike to Xzavier Henderson on a go-route on third-and-7. He also rushed for 43 yards, including a 33-yard touchdown run.
He didn’t maintain that high level of performance in the second half, though. He completed just five of 12 passes for 37 yards and threw a pair of interceptions, one because he stared down a receiver and the other because he took too long to make his read.
Mullen thinks Jones responded to the interceptions well and that this game was an improvement over last week for him.
“He was fine,” Mullen said. “He came back in, continued to manage the game. Those are just some growing mistakes. The first one was a bad one. The second one, he just has to speed up his read. He was just late on his throw on the second one. Those are things you’ve got to continue to learn. I thought he played much better this week than last week in the first half for sure. I think we just got sloppy in the second half. You have to execute every single snap of the game; there’s so few opportunities.”
Richardson has yet to make a major mistake like those interceptions this season, and he’s a walking highlight reel.
Richardson connected with Copeland for a 75-yard score on his very first snap. His throw had the perfect amount of air under it, and it hit Copeland’s outstretched hands in stride for the longest completion for the Gators under Dan Mullen.
Later in the first half, he received the snap and took an aggressive step forward to sell the run, a la Tim Tebow, before stepping back and hitting Copeland again for a 41-yard touchdown.
In the opening stages of the fourth quarter, he scrambled to his left and fired a pinpoint-accurate lazar into Copeland’s arms down the left sideline for 36 yards.
For the second week in a row, Richardson showed off his elite speed by outrunning everyone on the field for an 80-yard touchdown despite hobbling the last 20 yards or so after he tweaked his hamstring. It tied for the ninth-longest rush in program history.
Richardson didn’t play for the remainder of the game, and he walked off of the field with a slight limp after the game. Mullen didn’t provide any clarity regarding his availability against Alabama next week.
Linebacker Jeremiah Moon said that because the quarterbacks aren’t allowed to be hit in practice, the players are finding out what he’s capable of every week just like the fans are.
“It’s crazy,” Moon said. “You can’t touch the quarterback in practice, so some of the stuff he does on the field we haven’t even seen in practice. So, let him keep doing his thing. He’s a great athlete for his size. He’s 240 pounds, and he can fly and jump over [defenders] easily and can do everything.”
The one knock on Richardson entering Saturday was his accuracy. He didn’t have the best completion percentage in high school, and he only completed three of eight passes against Florida Atlantic.
But all three of his passes against USF were on the money and resulted in big plays. While it’s true that the Bulls’ defense isn’t very good, that last throw he made to Copeland along the sideline would’ve been impressive even without a defense on the field.
Jones said that while the fans are pitting he and Richardson against each other, it’s not that way inside the quarterback meeting room. The two of them are friends and support each other through the ups and downs.
“We really are really close,” he said. “We hang out a lot outside of football. Then you build that relationship, just by being quarterbacks, just different things we have to go through. I help him through a lot of stuff, and he helps me through a lot of stuff. Just being around the guy all this time, it helps just building that relationship with him. The late meetings, the long hours that we always have together, we’re always with each other, boosting each other, making sure we’re all doing the right things. It’s just a relationship you build.”
Mullen pumped the breaks on the Richardson hype after the game and denied that seniority plays a role in his decision to keep rolling with Jones.
“[Richardson] does special things,” Mullen said. “Doesn’t always do the right thing, but he does special things. So, we’ve got to keep coaching him to be efficient and make sure we’re making all the right reads.
“We’re trying to win football games. I have a responsibility to put everybody on the team in position to win, and there’s an awful lot that goes into that. I know everybody loves just looking at the two quarterbacks. There’s 10 other guys on the field, until I put in our two-quarterback offense, which I haven’t shown yet. Then there’s only nine other guys on the field. When you look at those things, my job is to put us in the best position to win football games and develop this football program to be the best it can be. That’s what we’re doing.”