Florida’s special teams units will look vastly different this season. Starting kicker Evan McPherson, starting punter Jacob Finn, starting long-snapper Brett DioGuardi and return man Kadarius Toney are all gone from the 2020 team.
But the Gators are a program that pride themselves on special teams under Dan Mullen, so the new crop of starters will be expected to make this a seamless transition.
The battle to replace McPherson could be one of the most competitive on the entire team. Jace Christmann transferred in from Mississippi State over the summer. He made 32 of his 40 field goal attempts with the Bulldogs, with a long of 51 yards. He missed just one extra point in four years. He was named a Freshman All-American after the 2017 season by the Football Writers Association of America.
His 80 percent field goal success rate tied for the best mark in Mississippi State history, and he’s tied for fourth on the school’s all-time scoring list.
However, he lost his starting job to Arizona State transfer Brandon Ruiz prior to last season. He attempted just five extra points and one kickoff in 2020, so he hasn’t faced the pressures of kicking long field goals in games for a while.
He’s facing stiff competition from Chris Howard. This will be his fifth year in the program after he joined the team as a walk-on prior to the 2017 season. Howard appeared in three games in 2019 and drilled all four of his extra-point attempts.
When McPherson tested positive for COVID-19 and missed the Missouri game in 2020, Howard filled in and made both of his field goal attempts and all five extra points.
Howard has a strong leg and will not cede this job to Christmann easily.
Mullen is confident in whichever player wins the job.
“It’ll be a good little competition between those two guys,” Mullen said. “Obviously, Chris has been with the program since I’ve been here, and I’ve seen unbelievable improvement of him from one year to the next within our program. I think [he] comes into the year with a lot of confidence.
“And then obviously, recruiting Jace out of high school, having him play for me, heck, I mean, he scored the points the last time we were in the stadium, and I was just on the opposite sideline this time. He’s the one that scored the points when we went out there to play them a couple years ago at Mississippi State against us. So, I know that he has experience and a background. So, it’ll be a good little battle for those two guys, but I think they work together, and it gives us the opportunity to make sure we have two kickers that are ready to go play.”
Meanwhile, the punting job will go to redshirt freshman Jeremy Crawshaw without contest. The Australian has a cannon for a right leg and averaged 49 yards on his two punts against Oklahoma in the Cotton Bowl. Crawshaw will likely also double as the holder for placekicks.
Freshman Rocco Underwood is the favorite to start at long-snapper. He’s one of the rare long-snappers to start his career on scholarship.
That just leaves the return jobs vacant. The Gators have plenty of explosive athletes to choose from, but they’ll have to sort out which players they trust the most and which players are too valuable to risk losing to injury on returns.
Redshirt freshman safety Fenley Graham was offered a scholarship largely because of his return abilities. He’ll get some reps at both kickoff returning and punt returning.
“Fenley coming out of high school, obviously, everybody knew that was a guy that was very much a utility player, a really good football player, can return punts, can return kicks, can move him around defensively,” Mullen said. “A guy who has a really natural instinct for the ball. Obviously, in the return games, he’s up there big.”
Mullen also mentioned running back Demarkcus Bowman and receiver Ja’Markis Weston as being options on kickoff returns, while receiver Xzavier Henderson and cornerback Kaiir Elam could be in the mix to return punts. Mullen said it’s still too early to declare anyone a favorite at either spot.
“We kind of really have been more on technique and [the] individual part of special teams rather than the return game and the full-on scheme,” he said. “That’s coming in the next week.”
The faces may be new on special teams, but the expectations will not.