By Will Miles
The Everything School
Yesterday at work, I was talking to a sales rep about my time at Florida (’99-04).
I was lamenting that the Urban Meyer years along with the basketball national championships came right after I graduated, but then I realized something.
I was there for the 10-2 season in 2001 when Florida was one stop away from beating Tennessee in early December to go play for an SEC – and possibly national – championship. I was also there for the ’99-00 basketball run that saw a Mike Miller/Udonis Haslem-led team make it all the way to the National Championship basketball game before falling to Michigan State.
So while it was a bit of a lull for Florida athletics while I was there, it was still more exciting than most people would ever get in their college experience, and it’s that way all the time. The Gators have 41 total athletic national championships. We are the only program to hold basketball and football championships at the same time. There are only four programs that have won national championships in baseball, basketball and football and Florida is the only program to hold all three in the last 20 years.
My point is that we shouldn’t take this for granted, as I was doing a little bit during my conversation. Florida is a really special place that has had a unique level of success. Football obviously gets the lions share of attention, but it’s truly remarkable the athletic program that has been built.
Baseball sweep of Miami
We were reminded of the prowess of the program once again when watching the Gators baseball team sweep the top-ranked Miami Hurricanes over the weekend.
It took the Gators 11 innings to win the first game 2-1, and another 10 to win the second game 7-4 before jumping on the Hurricanes early in game 3 on the way to a 5-3 victory. Perhaps more importantly, Florida pitchers struck out 33 ‘Canes during the series while surrendering those 8 runs.
But the most encouraging thing thus far has been the bats. It’s early, but look at the comparisons from last year to this year.
When all but one of your top-5 hitters is hitting way better than the year prior, you’re going to score some runs. We often hear fans and pundits talk about development when it comes to football and Dan Mullen or basketball and Mike White.
But we should take a moment to appreciate the job that Kevin O’Sullivan is doing at Florida. He has them as the number one team in the nation again, just three years removed from a national championship.
Softball at 16-2
Not to be outdone, the softball team is again flexing its muscles on the field.
The ladies are 16-2 and were ranked 7th in the most recent USA Today Coaches Poll that was released February 17. The Gators just lost on a walk-off to the number one team in the country (UCLA) in a game in California. The only other loss came to Michigan, a team now ranked 8th, but who is going to fall after losses to Iowa State, South Carolina and Liberty over the weekend.
Again, I marvel at the consistent excellence of the program. The consistency of the program coach Tim Walton has built means that we sometimes take the softball program winning for granted, but we shouldn’t.
Walton has led the program to seven regular season SEC titles and is a 5-time SEC coach of the year. And while I’ve enjoyed watching Kelly Barnhill the past few years, Walton was winning well before that, as his first SEC title was in 2008 and his first national title in 2014.
Footballl gives me a way to connect with my father and brother, as we make it a point to attend a game every year and keep in touch about the season all fall long. But softball gives me a way to connect with my daughter, as she and I can watch the Gators succeed at a sport that she enjoys playing.
That’s another great benefit to rooting for a school that’s good at everything.
Basketball – The home stretch
After a close loss to Kentucky, the basketball team is now 17-10 (9-5 SEC) with games left vs. LSU, at Tennessee, at Georgia and vs. Kentucky. They might make the tournament at 19-12, but I suspect they may need to go 3-1 to make it in.
The team has actually been playing better of late, with wins over teams they should beat against Arkansas, Texas A&M and Vanderbilt (the highlight of which was definitely Jerry Stackhouse’s green suit).
The team is still maddeningly inconsistent. One game, Andrew Nembhard puts up 17 (against Arkansas) and then only puts up 6 shots against Kentucky (4 points). Or Omar Payne puts up 19 points and 11 boards against Auburn and then takes eight games to exceed that total afterwards.
I tend to be more patient than most when it comes to the basketball program. After all, I was there when Billy Donovan led his team to the National Final and thought that was going to happen every year. I then remember all of the early round exits and the noise around whether he was the right guy to take Florida to the next level.
It took Donovan a decade to win his championships. I’m not saying Mike White should get 10 years to prove himself. I’m not even saying that you should be happy with the program or the level of player development you’ve seen.
What I’m saying is that Florida just took the time to emblazon Donovan’s name on the court. You only do that for a coach who has done something transformative at a school. His time in Gainesville was special and to expect that to be replicated by Mike White is probably unfair.
This isn’t the football program, where Steve Spurrier and Urban Meyer (and to some extent, Charley Pell) all have had success. Donovan is the only one, and I suspect that we’ll be looking back a decade from now appreciating that even more.
NCAA Tournament – Exciting and an example of why an expanded football playoff would be awful
I love the NCAA Tournament weekend.
During lunch, you go into the work cafeteria and CBS is switching between a ton of games. There are buzzer beaters and exciting finishes and even the 16 seeds dream of an upset (thanks Virginia).
But it really, really dilutes the regular season.
The fact that Florida can still make the tournament after such an up-and-down year is great for the Gators. But it means that very few of the regular season games matters individually. Sure, the totality makes a difference, but a committee is going to be tasked with comparing the schedules of Indiana and Florida to decide who gets in, two teams that have virtually no chance of winning the tournament.
Compare that to football, where often there are only four slots for five Power-5 conference winners.
Some think that is unfair. Some want a six or even an eight game playoff. But I think that would do the same thing to the college football season that I currently feel with the college basketball season: significantly dilute the impact.
The loss to LSU this fall in some ways felt like a positive. Florida proved that it could hang with a quality opponent (turns out way more than that) on the road and that the offense was capable of going toe-to-toe with the big boys. The one loss didn’t kill the Gators because they had a chance to win the East and redeem themselves.
The loss to Georgia was a kick in the gut.
It was a kick in the gut because it was Georgia and I hate the Bulldogs. But it was also a kick in the gut because it ended everything. It ended the chance at an SEC title. It ended the chance at a playoff berth. It ended the chance at a national championship.
Now, perhaps you could make the argument that level of impact made the rest of the games meaningless. In some ways, you are right, especially after Florida drew an inferior Virginia team in the Orange Bowl.
But I would submit that because each loss means something, I have to watch every game whereas I don’t feel remotely the same way about the basketball team. Is that because I like football more? Sure. But I also think it’s because while the totality of the basketball season matters, no one individual game matters until we get to SEC or NCAA tournament play.
Maybe I’m just old, but I like when the regular season matters.
The recruitment of Zachary Evans
5-star running back Zachary Evans (2020 class) scheduled an official visit with Florida coming up on March 20. The implications of this are pretty important.
I never want to evaluate a recruiting class based on one player and this is no different. Were Evans to commit to the Gators, that would only increase Florida’s national recruiting ranking to 7th, jumping past Auburn.
But combined with the transfers of Brenton Cox, Lorenzo Lingard and Justin Shorter along with the commitment of Gervon Dexter, that would raise Florida’s number of 5-star players to five. Last season, only Alabama, Ohio State, Georgia, USC, LSU, and Clemson had more than five 5-stars.
As I’ve written about repeatedly, top-100 talent – and especially 5-star talent – ends up in the NFL at a much higher rate than even just a few spots below. There’s a reason why those teams listed above make up three of the four playoff teams.
Mullen has been building the talent profile of his team slowly, adding a lot of blue-chip recruits but struggling to add true difference makers. Evans would be one more high-level shot to find someone on offense who can take the 15-yard gain and turn it into 80.
That’s really the last step to the offense going from good to great.
Defensive expectations for the 2020 season
One thing lost in the offensive futility under Jim McElwain was that the 2017 season was really horrid not because of the offense, but the defense.
That isn’t to say the Gators offense was good. It wasn’t. But it was bad in 2015 and 2016 as well and Florida still won 19 games. Florida was 102nd, 100th and 104th in yards per play gained under McElwain.
However, the defense was 7th, 4th and 67th in yards per play allowed in the same timeframe. So it was really the defensive step back that pushed Florida to the 4-7 season, though obviously there was little room for error with the offensive futility.
Todd Grantham has improved the Gators defense to 37th and 21st in yards per play allowed in 2018 and 2019. While the defense has been good, this hasn’t been an elite unit. In fact, Grantham has only had a top-10 defense in that category three times (twice at Louisville, once at Georgia) and has never ranked above 7th.
That worries me about 2020. There is a lot of experience leaving, with Jonathan Greenard, Jabari Zuniga, Adam Schuler, David Reese and C.J. Henderson departing. There is a lot of talent to replace those players, but the defense was a little bit fortunate last season, as the Gators ranked 12th in point per game allowed. Typically, there is less separation between yards per play allowed and point per game allowed.
I know Gators fans expect the defense to be really good next season based on the talent profile of the team going up. But I think a reasonable expectation for the season is that the defense stays about where it was in 2019. The question is then whether the offense can improve enough to overcome some of the deficiencies that may show on defense, especially early with all of the young players.
Offensive expectations for the 2020 season
There is a lot of Twitter debate going on about Kyle Trask vs. Emory Jones, but quarterback wasn’t really the problem for Florida in 2019. The biggest issue was the offensive line.
Football Outsiders has nine advanced statistics for offensive line play. Out of 128 FBS schools, the Gators’ line ranked 90th or worse in five of the nine. They ranked 90th or worse in four of the five rushing statistics.
The reality is that no matter how much better the QB play gets, the team is going to struggle without improved line play.
The good news is that improvement should be coming. The line was young in 2019, if not in age then in experience. Mullen has really improved both the talent profile and the numbers associated with the offensive line in the last two recruiting classes. That is going to show eventually.
I wrote last year that I expected to see significant growth and development of the line over the 2019 season due to John Hevesy’s track record. That didn’t really happen, at least not until the bowl game against Virginia. The expectation for 2020 should be that the line is much improved.
And that bodes well for the offense to improve in 2020. Florida ranked 23rd in yards per pass but only 80th in yards per rush. To be a truly elite offense, the rushing number is going to have to make its way into the 20s or at worse, the 30s. But I think there’s a good chance that will happen.
Trask vs. Emory
One reason that may happen is continued development of the QB in the running game.
Kyle Trask only ran for 8 yards last season, but he looked much more limited in the running game after injuring his knee against Auburn. In fact, the only time he really looked active in the running game was in the Orange Bowl against Virginia.
That’s an important thing to note. The question I have is whether that is due to Mullen being uncomfortable should Trask further injure himself – forcing Emory in at starting QB – or whether it was actually a response to the limitations that the knee injury put on Trask.
Regardless, there’s no doubt that a QB who can run for even just 200 or 300 yards in a season greatly enhances Mullen’s offense and helps the offensive line. I expect the line to be better in 2020 but to expect it to be a top-20 unit is probably a bit much.
Thus, I get the clamoring for Jones to be the starter. He “fits” Mullen’s offense much better than Trask in that he is a traditional running QB. But people calling for Trask to against be the backup overlook the fact that in his first action since high school, he not only acquitted himself well, but actually thrived. This is especially true when you consider that he didn’t have the benefit of the cupcake opponents early that most inexperienced QBs get.
Perhaps Mullen will get Jones into the game more often ala Tim Tebow in 2006. Perhaps Jones will overtake Trask in fall camp and this will all be a moot point. But I suspect that the biggest thing coming from Mullen having more trust in Jones to be the starter will end up being an increased number of rushes and an increased effectiveness for Trask when he’s running the ball.
After all, if you don’t have to worry about Trask getting injured, you can have him take more risks in the running game.
Overall expectations for the 2020 season
So where does that put us for 2020?
Well, let’s assume the offense improves to a top-10 offense. And let’s assume that the defense stays somewhere around 25-30 as it has been the past two seasons.
Teams with that combination were relatively limited last season (Ohio State, Clemson and Alabama). So that’s what the expectations for 2020 should be. If the defense stays the same and the offense takes a significant step up, Florida should against be competing against the big boys.
I think if we’re really honest with ourselves, we watched the Georgia game – and even the LSU game for that matter – and knew it would be an upset if Florida pulled it out. Against LSU, it felt like they could. For most of the game against Georgia, it did not.
I don’t think that will be the feeling in 2020. Florida may not pull out those games against LSU and Georgia. But it won’t be an upset if they pull off the win, at least not much of one.
Great analysis!!!!