A most painful sunday morning

For me, that painful Sunday morning of the college football season arrives when the Gators are eliminated from contention to represent the East in the SEC championship game. That most painful Sunday morning arrives when we are eliminated and a coaching change is imminent. Sadly, the time has come to acknowledged that the Will Muschamp era as head coach of the University of Florida football program – barring some of the unlikeliest circumstances imaginable – will conclude this year.

It’s tremendously sad for me not only because I rarely like to celebrate failure but also because I know there is a transition ahead that I very much wanted the program to avoid. That’s unavoidable now, however.

It was unthinkable to me that Jeff Driskel would start this homecoming game against Missouri. It should have been unthinkable for Will Muschamp. That it wasn’t is reason enough alone for him to be fired. That we were forced – at Homecoming! – to watch the continued painful regression of Jeff Driskel at quarterback, time after time after time, was insulting. That Treon Harris was not inserted into the game until Florida’s third series – at our ten yard line! – was eye-opening and especially damning of Will Muschamp.

It was if someone wanted to see this kid fail so as to shut up all the know-nothing idiots (this writer included) who have been demanding we turn things over to the only Gator QB that hasn’t demonstrated genuine ineptitude this season. And fail on that series he did. Apparently, a hard decision had been made to give Jeff the first two series and then Treon the next two. That’s the most charitable explanation for what happened and the only explanation for giving your true freshman his first series in an SEC game ever at your own 10 yard line.

Had you turned the game over to him and this happened to be where the first series began . . . okay, so be it. But this? Yeah, you’re really trying to protect the kid when you do that. One disastrous series by Treon and the game is now 14-zip, one more series by Treon that is a four-and-out; then we – remarkably – turn the entire second quarter over to Jeff. Except, of course, Jeff gets hurt and limps into the locker room so Treon comes in to run out the clock.

Even more astonishing, and I mean genuinely ASTONISHING, Coach Muschamp gave Jeff four straight drives of pure ineptitude in the third quarter as the score balloons from 20-zip to 42-zip. I won’t even recount the nonsense here. Mercifully, Treon is then brought on at the six-minute mark of the third quarter and – incredibly – we have our very first drive of the entire game. Touchdown, Florida.

Context for my Exasperation

For me, every college football season arrives with a certain number of predetermined markers floating in my head, and one particular marker holds an especially prominent place in my psyche. It isn’t one I particularly dwell upon but it’s always looming; as mentioned earlier, it is that painful Sunday morning when we are eliminated from contention for the SEC East championship.

Like many Gators upon arrival of yet another college football season, I’m interested to know how we look at the beginning of practices in the brutal summer heat of Florida. I want to know how we look after the rampant speculation about position battles concludes with the announcement of an official two-deep chart. I’m always intensely curious to see how we look in our first-game against what is normally a preseason sacrificial lamb, and equally curious to see how we look after our first conference game.

After that, the survive-and-advance marathon that is SEC football begins in earnest for me. At the University of Florida, we have the most accomplished athletic department in America when viewed through the metric of resources, competition and major sport titles. Fortunately, our money-maker – Gator Football – has been an equal opportunity participant in our athletic department success. In the last quarter-century, this has made Gator Nation the most accomplished and successful football program in America during this era.

No, we don’t have the most national titles during this period but we do operate in the most competitive environment in the United States; battling the Miami Hurricanes and Florida State Seminoles for supremacy in an American mega-state with professional franchises in multiple sports all over the state. Yes, the Canes and Noles have a combined eight national titles but none of them have been earned while enduring the fierce competition of America’s most competitive college football conference. Though they will never admit it, Florida’s ten appearances in the SEC Championship Game, more than any other SEC school, with a whopping seven titles earned leading to three magnificent national championships, is the absolute envy of our in-state peers.

The saying is true: it’s hard to be humble when you’re a true blue Fightin’ Florida Gator.

This success has made my operating philosophy each and every season very easy to maintain: until proven otherwise, the Gators are going to challenge for a conference title and national championship. From my perspective, that philosophy never needs to be grounded in reality because reality will take care of itself. The philosophy is firmly rooted in the mentality of a man completely satisfied dwelling in the realm of fandom.

I highly recommend it.

But when *I* reach the end of the line, it is a virtual certainty that the large majority of Gator Nation is already there.

My Thinking after the LSU Game

I was back to where I was after Tennessee: Jeff Driskel starting our next game was unthinkable. There would be a mass revolt if Jeff steps out there as a starter; the students, in particular I thought, would be merciless. I feel for the guy. Yes, Tevin should have caught that touchdown pass. But he didn’t. And our receiving corps dropped others. More importantly, we were still in position to win on our last possession and Jeff made a series of classic Jeff Driskel decisions on our last offensive play.

What were those decisions? Well, y’all watched it in real time and probably were fearing the worst just as I was so we were likely all shouting no, no, no at the same time: [1] first, panic – there’s no other way to explain his decisionmaking on that last play; [2] then make an improper decision on who to throw to based upon the defense you see; [3] then, stare down your intended target; [4] after staring down your target, remain so clueless as to not notice the defense is on to you and closing in on your target with double-coverage; [5] finally, and disastrously (and, yes, this is where the panic was really evidenced – everything else on the decisionmaking tree of our last play Jeff has done more often than I care to admit), still make the decision to throw the damn ball with barely more than 30 seconds left into the middle of the field around our 42 yard line even though we had no timeouts left – instead of just tossing it out-of-bounds and living to advance into the next play.

The one thing Jeff couldn’t do was risk the game, and that’s precisely what he did. My head felt as if it was about to explode. He situationally had to know he could only do two things: work the sidelines or pass sufficiently down the field for a first down that would allow for a field goal opportunity . . . and he did neither on that last play.

First-year players, no matter how legendary in high school, can regrettably commit that kind of inexperienced mistake. Fourth-year players at such a critical moment can’t do that. They simply can’t.

I really feel for Jeff Driskel but ultimately this isn’t about him. LSU is an outstanding team that is improving with each week (as the Kentucky game clearly proved) and we had them on the ropes here at Florida Field and should have beaten them.

We would have been in the driver’s seat for the SEC East championship; that we blew it exasperated the hell out of me.

My Thinking after the Mizzou Game

I think my first paragraphs of this column tell you that with all the certainty that is required what I’m thinking after this game. My fear after the Alabama game was that Jeff Driskel would get Will Muschamp fired. We are now staring at that door with the Florida-Georgia game looming.

Gator Nation has determined that Jeff Driskel (for a variety of reasons) can’t play the position of quarterback especially well but for some amazing reason, he especially can’t quarterback a system that appeared geared toward his presumed strengths. The jury is now in and Jeff quite simply is not a Division 1 quarterback. More importantly, the men on his team have unequivocally made a determination that Jeff isn’t simply a liability, he’s a severe liability.

After the regressions of this season, viewable by all in crystal-clear high definition on the SEC Network, who could possibly disagree?

[1] It’s Treon Time.

[2] I want a clear announcement that it’s Treon Time.

[3] I want everyone on the staff to get the hell out of his way and let the kid go play.

That means allowing the kid to attempt downfield passes on first down on multiple occasions. That means acknowledging the control-freak tendencies of coaches has been a disaster for us this season and that Treon freelancing couldn’t possibly have produced a worse result.

Get the hell out of his way, recognize that he may very well be Emmitt Smith at the quarterback position, and severely underestimated for the God-given talent he has. For goodness sakes, please let us FINALLY see what this man can do with the game turned over to him. It would have been so much better to have done so against Mizzou but if it has to be Florida-Georgia so be it.