At least that’s what Vern Lundquist, CBS analyst, said with just over six and a half minutes remaining in this year’s Florida-Georgia game.  Georgia had so quickly fallen apart, sputtered so hard in the second half and so thoroughly self-destructed that not even the CBS announcers tried to prop up any hope of this being a competitive game after that point.

Coach Richt had removed his starting quarterback and replaced him with backup Logan Gray.  With a commanding 17 point lead Florida smelled blood and teed off for the quarterback every play with devestating results.  In Tim Tebow’s final game he combined for 250 total yards with 85 of them coming on the ground.  Two of his four touchdowns came on the ground breaking his tie with Georgia running back Herschel Walker for career touchdowns in the SEC.  On a day where everything seemed to go Florida’s way, Georgia continued their season long knack of committing penalties and turnovers to allow the Gators to turn a 3 point game (14 to 10) into a 24 point rout.

While the Gators looked more like their 2008 selves than their recent 2009 version, this IS Georgia we are talking about.  A team who has come into the season seemingly determined to make every offense they face seem like the 2007 Patriots.  The offense came out spreading the ball around but seemed to revert to the more conservative performance as the game went along.  The reshuffling of the offensive line seemed to pay early dividends but the running game seemed to sputter in the second half.  There is more work to be done but Florida’s staff has definitely taken a step in the right direction in addressing some of the lingering problems that have hampered the offense thus far.

Despite the win, here are some philosophical suggestions for the future.

1) Use Emmanuel Moody more early in the game to wear down the defense.  This should allow Demps and Rainey to have an even greater advantage as a change of pace back with their quickness.  I don’t mean that Demps, Rainey and perhaps Gilisslee shouldn’t rotate in but let Moody who is the most physical Florida back pound on the defense before trying to hit them with the little guys.

2) Limit the use of Rainey and Demps inside, especially Rainey.  Both are small backs who can only take so much punishment.  Of the two Demps is the better inside runner with better straight ahead burst.  Rainey is a guy who likes to use his shiftiness and cut backs to create big plays.  His tendency to dance in the hole combined with his diminuitive size leaves him vulnerable to injuries.  Basically he spends too much time in one plays standing straight up.  In comparison Demps tends to always be moving foward and dives forward for positive yards making him the better inside runner of the two.  Brandon James is absolutely inequipped to run inside as the blast of air from a falling defensive lineman could knock him down.

3) Once we have a big lead we need to specifically move away from calling plays that involve Tebow running the ball.  There will always be the scramble and the play where Tebow will just try to make something happen with his legs but there is absolutely no reason to risk losing him here in the stretch run.  Think of it as something similar to a pitch count limiting how many hits Tebow takes in a game.  If necessary tell Tebow to GET RID OF THE BALL rather than absorb the extra pounding.

4) Similar to the way we started the game we need to make a concerted effort to spread the ball around and throw the ball in the second half as well as the first.  Granted with a lead like we had against Georgia the smart move is to run the ball and run the clock to shorten the game.  But in the process Tebow too way to many hits against a team that would love nothing more than to end his career.  Tim needs to be protected (even from himself) as much as we need to spread the ball around to best attack opposing defenses.  In an effort to promulgate this effect Tim needs to be encourages to get the ball to the short receivers who are open and look downfield when scrambling.  Currently Tim is reluctant to throw it short believing he can do better with his legs and thus is not looking down the field where we might hit a big play.

5) End the Brandon James experiment.  I’m not saying he shouldn’t play but he shouldn’t be part of the game plan.  You would think that BJ and Rainey would be terrifying weapons in space but we rarely put Rainey in space to take advantage of his ability (running him inside as much as we try and get him on the perimeter) and James has not proven he deserves such opportunities.  Not only has his special teams play declined with his additional offensive responsibilities but he tends to dance too much on sweeps instead of bursting upfield, his hands are not good in games (catching passes and holding onto the ball) and his diminuative size makes it hard for Tebow to get him the ball and means a high throw could easily turn into an interception.

Despite the big win I think we will see continued improvement offensively.  I hope Chris Rainey can recover from his shoulder injury because I believe he could be a big factor in the open field despite being ignored in that regard for much of the year.  Nelson proved he can be an integral part of the offense.  Deonte Thompson is not getting the ball enough.  He should be getting the same attention from Tebow that Cooper gets.  Cooper is Timmy’s main guy (which is fine) but Thompson has the same big play ability and can’t become the forgotten man.  Timmy significantly improved his play from the previous three games and if he can return to the level he played at the end of last year the sky is the limit for this team.

As always, Go Gators!

Seriously, I FURTZ-blurble-WOOOOOOO!!@!111-bxxzt am very ZZZZZZZZZZZT

I happen to think @@#%@#@# DGSD GS GSG F GF
sdfg

It’s like My cat is loose
on the key or sometht-2i00—0000 0 ZZZZZZZZZZZT THE BEST- E EW=

WON THE 4th q give him GRRRMMPP-ZTT-flimp!- give him the HEISMAN
SEC CHAMPS

S-E-C-S-E-C-S-E-C-FFZZZZZZTT-gulp-BAM1!!!

63-5. This was a good showing by the Gators we expected to see at the beginning of this season. Kentucky had no chance from the beginning and to be honest, I felt the tiniest glimmer of sympathy for this team, who were playing without their two best offensive weapons… then I remembered our favorite commenter, Daniel, and the feelings of empathy subsided. Florida brought the pain early and often: 2 blocked punts and a blocked field goal in the first half drained the ‘Cats completely and it was smooth sailing the rest of the way.

Key stats:

Total yards: UF 446 / UK 268
Rushing yards: UF 214 / UK 141
Passing yards: UF 232 / UK 127
Tebow: 11/15, 180 yards, 2 TD/1 INT, 2 rushing TDs (48 yards)

The game was over in the first quarter, but the second string didn’t take the field until late in the third. It was great seeing John Brantley throw his first TD pass as a Gator QB. We are seeing the future in Brantley; perhaps as soon as next year, but hopefully we’ll get to see Tebow off as a senior.

Superlative:

1. Special teams, obviously. You don’t block two punts and a field goal unless you’re really special.
2. Defense. Kentucky has been competitive against every team they’ve played until now, and the defense surrendered only three points.
3. Running game. This is quickly becoming Florida’s strength; Tebow attempted only 15 passes in this game. That stat shows just how good Florida’s o-line and speedster RB corps has become since the loss to Ole Miss.

Good:

1. Tebow. Not great, but good, perhaps very good. It’s hard to argue against 4 total TDs, but some of Tebow’s passes were less than crisp.
2. Kestahn Moore. It’s good to see the senior RB playing well. He appeared to cough up the ball in garbage time, but replay showed him down. Moore still doesn’t have an explosive burst, but he looks like he’s become a more-than-serviceable power back.

Not good:

1. Caleb Sturgis. Two kickoffs out-of-bounds? What the hell?
2. Ball security. Not sure why Tebow keeps putting the ball on the ground, but at least he’s been getting them back.

Overall grade: A+. There’s no other way to grade a 63-5 beatdown of a competitive SEC team. Keep in mind that Kentucky came within a whisker of beating Alabama in their own house, losing only by a field goal (17-14). Bama fans ought to be pretty nervous when considering the prospect of facing Florida meet in the SEC championship game, should that happy event occur.

It’s the 3rd quarter, Florida is up 49-3, and I’m calling it. Florida moves to 6-1 and is in full control of their SEC destiny. The ‘Cats fall behind, but perhaps a positive sign was the play of Randall Cobb, who certainly seems to offer Kentucky far more than Mike Hartline at the QB position.

Hopefully we’ll see John Brantley lead a couple of drives this game. Here’s to hoping we’ll be injury-free when the final bell rings.

Domination. Utter domination. That is what Urban Meyer’s Florida Gators served to the Bayou Bengals of LSU. 51-21… I can hardly believe it.

Unlike Arkansas, Florida won this one in every way it is possible to win. They won it with offense. They won it with defense. And they won it with special teams. All units played with total intensity from the first tick of the game to the last. It was the first “complete” game we’ve seen from the Gators this season.

If Florida could play that way every time, our boys would never be defeated.

We’ll do a postmortem, to be sure, but for now, a few key points:

The excitement is back: somebody got the “Free Tebow” message to the coaching staff. It showed, and it worked. Tim Tebow looked and played like, well, Tim Tebow. The Heisman Trophy winner. The best quarterback in college football. Tebow made faster and better reads, threw great looking deep and short passes, and was in total command of the offense. When Tebow plays the way God intended him to play, the excite-o-meter pegs 11. Good to have you back, Superman.
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Let’s get one thing out of the way right up front. Florida won the game, survived, and advanced — after a fashion. They won the game. Beating SEC opponents, ladies and gentlemen. That is the goal. We are not going to engage in the endless self-flagellation and agonized second-guessing which accompanies “winning with issues”.

Wait a minute. This is O&B Hue. Of course we are! Congrats to the boys for winning a game they were supposed to win, but yeah, we’ve got some ground to cover.

Lest there be any doubt, this was not a blowout. I don’t care that the final score was 38-7. I don’t care that the O generated 513 yards of total offense. Arkansas moved the ball between the 20s on our defense with relative impunity for most of three quarters while Florida moved in fits and starts, and frankly caught Lady Luck on a good day. Without 21 points scored largely in garbage time, this game could easily have looked much different. Arkansas turned the ball over twice on fourth down in the first half, and Casey Dick’s ill-conceived attempt at a touchdown pass in the final seconds of 2Q was a gift-wrapped interception for Joe Haden.
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In the wake of Saturday’s loss to Mississippi the brunt of the criticism has fallen upon the Florida Gator offense and, more specifically, upon the shoulders of Dan Mullen and Tim Tebow.  In an effort to determine the legitimacy of such criticisms I watched the game with a specific focus on the Florida offense.  What follows are my personal notes of what I saw.

1ST DRIVE
Percy Harvin had some good runs.  The protection to begin the game seems to be good and Tebow has time to find his receivers.  Still, why run Rainey to the short side of the field?  When you have an athlete like Rainey who has great speed and open field moves why are we running him to the short side where he has less room to maneuver.  It seems like we run Tebow to the wide side . . . so why Rainey to the short side? 

On a similar note . . . why run Rainey to the middle?  Two runs for Chris, to the short side and in the middle, away from his strengths as a back.

It’s 4th and 3 and why aren’t we running any slants to what is a WIDE open middle of the field?  Oh yeah, because we are only using our wide receivers as decoys to draw away the defensive backs so we can hit Percy on an in pattern.  Who would expect that?  Think Ole Miss might catch on to that as the game goes along???

2ND DRIVE
Our first pass is an incompletion.  I don’t expect every pass to be caught but why is it we have so many routes that seem to put multiple receivers in the same area of the field?  Unfortunately TV broadcast does not give us the whole field so there are players I can’t see.  Is this because of poor play design, receivers running the wrong routes or perhaps not running crisp routes (cutting sharp on cuts, turning the DBs hips, etc, etc).

While watching a pre-snap formation on 2nd and 8 I remember thinking I’d option to the wide side of the field away from the trips (it was a three WR formation on the short side) and see what I could get in the open field.  Instead Mullen runs the option to the short side where all the DBs are.  Why?  That’s great if you have an excellent blocking team but why take the chance when you have such premier fast and shifty players like Harvin, James, Moody and Rainey?  It can’t be that we run to the short side to stop the clock.  With the new rules that doesn’t help a team anymore.

Emmanuel Moody is a stud.  He has unbelievable ability.

Mullen ran Rainey to the WIDE side for a change and . . . get this . . . he uses his quicks and shiftiness to pick up an easy 10 yards.

Tebow is dropped for a loss.  Why do we use bunch formations so often when running Tebow?  Remember when we used to SPREAD out the defense and put Tebow in space to run?  When did Tebow become Earl Campbell?  All these extra bodies do is clog the area and make it more likely Tebow is running into a defensive lineman instead of a linebacker or defensive back where he has the size advantage.  If you could just roadgrade out the defense with numbers then we could run Kestahn Moore all day.

We bring in the formation again on 2nd and 12 and run the ball inside.  If you bring the defense in tight attack OUTSIDE!!!  No gain.

Not a great throw from Tebow on 3rd and 12 but Murphy needs to make that catch.  He’s supposedly a leader and one of our more consistent receivers in practice but I don’t see it on gameday.  Sure he makes some plays but he doesn’t make some.  For our top WR outside of Harvin we need better than that.

3RD DRIVE
Tebow has all day but throws a lazy pass that could easily have been intercepted and run the other way for a pick six.  Luckily the ball is tipped up and Harvin catches for a TD.  On the replay you can easily see that Harvin was open for a while and Tebow threw the ball late after a double pump.  Why is Tebow so tentative?  This could easily have gone very badly for us but we get the break.  The safety who almost made the pick just read Tebow’s eyes.  Throw that pass on time and no one gets within 10 yards of Harvin.  (more…)

Was I a little too hard on the Vols? My father thinks so. He points out that the Vols actually totaled 258 yards to the Gators’ 243, won the time of possession battle (barely) and threatened to score in the red zone twice. The game could have been much closer, he says, and save for a few critical miscues (which seem to be emblematic of modern-day Tennessee football) Tennessee played decently well.

Dad, you’re a great guy and I love ya, but I don’t agree. Watching the replay, Florida dominated Tennessee defensively and were efficient on offense. Brandon James consistently gave the Gators great field position, and Tennessee’s punts from within their own territory contributed to Florida’s short drives (and low overall yardage). Finally, the new clock rules (blast them!) robbed us of a great deal of football.

Florida’s drives:

Drive 1: starts at UT 44, TD
Drive 2: starts at UT 23 after UT fumble, FG
Drive 3: punt return for TD
Drive 4: starts at UF 3 after UT fumble, FG
Drive 5: kneel-down after intercepting Crompton in endzone with :02 remaining in 1H
Drive 6: starts at UF 9, punt
Drive 7: starts at UT 47, TD
Drive 8: starts at UF 38, FG
Drive 9: starts at UF 46, turnover on downs — Meyer elects not to score at UT 10 (game is over)
Drive 10: kneel-down, victory formation

As you can see, Florida started only three of their drives from within their own territory, and one of those were at the Gators’ 38-yard line. Throw in three meaningless possessions (drives 5, 9, and 10) and you have only seven meaningful offensive possessions. Of those seven, Florida failed to score on only one of them (drive 6) and at that point the defense had already proved they could stop Tennessee’s offense. Meyer had shifted into field position mode by that point.
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Year2 has posted what I believe to be a very cogent description of exactly what happened, when, and why against Miami’s defense on Saturday night.

The most glaring problem was a general refusal to commit to blitz-busting tactics. Every now and then Florida would use the kinds of screens, quick passes, and extra protection sets that are needed to make aggressive defenses pay. However, they didn’t do them enough to get the Miami linebackers to back off consistently. They kept the pressure on nearly the whole game.

That pressure did wear on Tebow.

The thing that turned the tide in the Gators favor and allowed them to score so much at the end was finally deciding to do things to counter the blitz consistently. They used more quick passes to get the ball out of Tebow’s hands faster, and on the plays that were slower to develop, they had Kestahn Moore in the backfield to pick up the blitzing linebackers.

As a result, Miami stopped sending the heat so much and instead had the linebackers drop into coverage more. That gave Tebow plenty of time to shop for receivers, and the Gator wideouts consistently won their battles. When the Hurricanes did have extra guys come in, Moore was there to buy Tebow enough time to make good decisions.

Tebow had his issues in the second quarter, but many of the Florida offense’s struggles had to do with scheme and play calling. For whatever reason, Mullen didn’t react much to what the defense was doing until late in the third quarter. That is probably the best example I can give for Shannon and Young outcoaching Mullen.

Watching the replay, I’d have to agree. It seems Florida was totally unconcerned with adjusting the gameplan in the first two quarters of play. Not until the third quarter did the protections change, the ball come out quicker, and the offense in general finally clicked. I blame scheme and coaching above personnel in this case.

When you field a “below the rim” team like the 2008 Florida Gators, you live and die by your shot. They didn’t fall for Florida in their NIT semifinal game against the Minutemen. With a pretty good defensive effort and some made free throws, you can make up for that; but the Gators were good for only one of two, holding the Minutemen to 42% field goal shooting, while going a miserable 8-21 from the charity stripe.

Game over. Season over.

It was a roller coaster ride of a season: sometimes exhilarating, occasionally terrifying and often downright frustrating.

The Gators didn’t lose to UMass because of heart or intensity, they lost because they’re simply not a complete basketball team that is capable of shifting gears and winning games with “Plan B.”

This team is a work in progress. The pieces are not fundamentally flawed, but the puzzle hasn’t come together yet, and it might take another season to really get things to gel.

Still, I’ve grown to appreciate this squad again. Not just because they made a deep NIT run, which was nice, but because of the way they banded together and tried to pull out a championship. Maybe it just wasn’t in the cards this year.

Next year, fellas, Gator Nation expects you to be better. Much better. With the talent on this squad, a year of off-season conditioning, and a quick glance around the SEC at what’s returning, I see no reason why you shouldn’t be contending to win the SEC. No reason at all. And without question we should be discussing which seed you’ll earn, rather than which tournament you’ll play in, next February. (more…)