Week one of the 2021 Gators football season is in the books. The No. 13 Gators defeated Florida Atlantic, 35-14, on Saturday in a game that was hard to watch at times and thrilling at others.
UF will hit the road this week for the first time to take on South Florida. But first, here are my five thoughts on the week that was.
1. Emory Jones’ performance was very discouraging, to say the least.
I knew he wasn’t the most accurate passer in the country, but I expected much more from him than what I saw on Saturday. He missed multiple wide-open receivers over the middle of the field without any pressure in his face.
His two interceptions were inexcusable. On the first one, he locked onto a receiver in the corner of the end zone and threw a pass right at a defender. He had Nay’Quan Wright open over the middle and never even looked his way.
On the second one, he lofted a ball that stayed in the air way too long that was intended for Rick Wells. If he had gunned it in there, it might’ve been a completion. But by floating it the way he did, he put Wells in a position where all he could do was try to play defense.
There was another play where Malik Davis was about to come open down the sideline on a wheel route. Jones correctly identified that but threw a bullet pass that should’ve been intercepted and returned for a touchdown. If he had lobbed that one, it would’ve been a touchdown for Davis.
His decision-making and understanding of what type of throw to make in a given situation was shockingly poor. You could maybe have some tolerance for those kinds of mistakes if he was an underclassman, but he should know better as a fourth-year junior.
The Gators need to throw the ball better moving forward, or this is going to be a tough offense to watch.
2. That being said, it’s not time to anoint Anthony Richardson as a future superstar yet.
Richardson only completed three of his eight passes. Two of them were screen passes, and the other was a 36-yard completion to Ja’Markis Weston that was extremely underthrown. He was off target just about every time they asked him to throw the ball past the line of scrimmage.
Yes, his 73-yard touchdown run and his hurdle of a defender were fun to watch, but you have to consider the quality of the opponent he was facing. Do you really think he’s going to outrun the entire Alabama defense for 73 yards or jump over a Georgia defender?
Richardson may very well prove to be a terrific player, and he may even become the starter at some point this season. But let’s not act like Richardson is this slam dunk playmaker that is guaranteed to be an upgrade over Jones.
Richardson ran the ball well against FAU, but he’s got a ton of room for improvement as a passer.
3. This was a weird game for the offensive line.
The Gators ran the ball for 400 yards, their most in a game in nearly seven years. They scored four rushing touchdowns and averaged 8.7 yards per carry. Two players rushed for more than 100 yards, and Jones wasn’t too far away at 74 yards. They didn’t give up a sack.
Those are historically great statistics that the Gators would obviously love to duplicate every week, but I left the game feeling that the offensive line could’ve done more.
Because Richardson and Jones piled up a bunch of yards on scrambles and perimeter runs, I think the stats make it seem like the offensive line played better than they did.
They had trouble generating much push up the middle at times, especially in short-yardage and goal-line situations. They gave up four tackles-for-loss.
As the competition gets tougher, the number of huge plays figures to shrink. I’m interested to see if the running game is capable of consistently picking up four or five yards per play against SEC opponents.
The explosiveness of the running game is outstanding, but I’m still not sold on their efficiency.
4. Similarly, I’m not sure what to make of the defensive performance.
On the positive side, they gave up just 173 yards and zero points in the first three quarters. They sacked FAU quarterback N’Kosi Perry six times and recovered a couple of fumbles.
But some of the issues we saw last season were still present on Saturday; they just weren’t as devastating because of the extreme talent differential.
The defensive tackles got moved out of the way at times, which allowed the Owls to pick up rushing yards in chunks. The linebackers got out of position and took some bad angles. The defensive backs played way off of the ball in third-and-medium situations.
FAU converted five of 12 third downs, and Perry passed for 261 yards.
UF’s defense committed too many dumb penalties, including a roughing-the-passer penalty, a blatant pass-interference call on Jason Marshall when he was in great position to force an incompletion and a late hit out of bounds.
When you’re struggling to get off of the field already, you cannot give opponents a fresh set of downs, especially against some of the teams that the Gators will face this season.
This was a decent performance by the defense, but there are still plenty of things to be concerned about.
5. The Gators played an excellent game on special teams.
This got kind of lost in the shuffle with Jones’ struggles, the huge night rushing and Zachary Carter’s three sacks.
Chris Howard made all five of his extra-point attempts. Jeremy Crawshaw averaged 49 yards on his two punts, including a 55-yarder that pinned the Owls inside their own 15.
Xzavier Henderson averaged 16.7 yards on his three punt returns, including a 33-yard return. He seems to have a good feel for where the openings are going to be, and he’s fast enough to explode through them.
Jace Christmann’s four kickoffs resulted in two touchbacks and returns to the 17 and the 20. Howard also boomed a touchback on one of his two kickoffs.
The Gators didn’t attempt a field goal, so that’s still a mystery, but this looks like it could be a very good special teams unit.