In a previous article I stated my opinion that Ron Zook should be the national coach of the year.  Following Illinois upset win over #1 Ohio State I thought his accomplishments this year at Illinois warranted such accolades.  Over on a sister site, Saurian Sagacity, there was also post regarding Ron Zook but one that took a quite different tact.  We have great respect for our brothers at SS and it’s not expected that we agree on every issue but this is something quite puzzling to me.  Because it is an issue that we once were in agreement upon but now have quite different perspectives.
 
No one is suggesting that Ron Zook is a Saint, far from it.  I had lost faith in Coach Zook before the end of the second season, in fact the close loss to Miami that many Gator fans had taken hope in I had found to be painfully unsettling.  The lack of conditioning, the inability of the staff to calm the young team, the coaching decisions that aided Miami’s comeback all portrayed a trend that would haunt Zook in his time at Florida.  Personally, I found his decision-making to be as faulty off the field as on the field.  Zook’s firing offered the Gator Nation a time to rejoice, look to the future and believe that better days awaited.
 
Yet as happy as I was (perhaps ecstatic would be a better term) to see Zook go, I still consider Ron Zook to be a Gator.  I will not dismiss the positive contribution’s he made to the program despite the negatives he also brought.  Zook was an assistant for the Gators long before he was ever a head coach.  Zook was a great recruiter for the program and coached some of the best special teams Florida had ever had pre-Urban Meyer.   Florida never had a dominant defense during his stint at defensive coordinator but never did I see a defensive squad that didn’t take the field and play hard for coach Zook (as I sometimes wondered for “other” UF D Coordinators in the Spurrier era).
 
As horrific as Zook’s collapse at Florida was, it wasn’t entirely his fault.  From the very first moment he was hired he found himself under the gun.  Instead of being embraced as a savior he was vilified as a demon.  Who can forget that within days of his hiring by Jeremy Foley (almost universally considered one of if not THE best Athletic Director in the country) the corresponding website entitled http://www.fireronzook.com/???  In other words, the pressure on Zook far exceeded that which any other Florida coach had ever tried to produce under.  Coaches like Spurrier and Meyer, both of whom had previous head coaching experience, were viewed a salvation for the program while a majority of Gator fans were pessimistic of Zook’s chances and some were certain he would fail. (more…)

Three years ago at this time Ron Zook was out of a job.  Following at 38-31 upset loss to Mississippi State, Florida Athletic Director gave his longtime friend his pink slip.  Zook had failed at one of the premier football programs in the country in his first head coaching opportunity.  Some wondered if Zook’s head coaching career was dead.  Would the former NFL coordinator be headed back to the league and remain a lifelong assistant?  Luckily for Coach Zook, not every football program in the country saw his accomplishments at Florida as a complete disaster.  Zook finished the season for Florida and after the MSU game went 3-1 including an upset win over 7 point loss to heavily favored Georgia and a 20-13 win at FSU (something not previously accomplished since 1986).
 
The University of Illinois had just fired head coach Ron Turner who had gone 1-11 and 3-8 in the previous two seasons.  With Zook having the reputation of a tireless worker and outstanding recruiter, the Illini gambled on the recently fired Ron Zook to return their struggling football program to a competitive state.  In that first year at Illinois, the Fighting Illini endured a record of 2-9, including a record of 0-8 in the Big 10.  While his first recruiting class was hampered by the short period between his hiring and national signing day, Zook’s second recruiting class began to show the promise that many had predicted as Zook landed a top 15 class with such big time recruits as Juice Williams (QB), Vontae Davis (CB) and Jeff Cumberland (TE). 
 
Despite the influx of young talent the 2006 season’s improvement wasn’t noticeable from the teams overall record.  Illinois again only won 2 games although they did win their first Big 10 Conference game in the Zook tenure.  While the overall record of 2-10 might have shown little return for the effort there was definitely an improvement on the field.  The Fighting Illini did not close out games very well but they were much more competitive and improved greatly in virtually every statistical category.  In 2005 the average margin of defeat for Illinois was 32 points but by 2006 that margin was down to 8 points per game.  Additionally one of Ohio State’s toughest regular season games was late in the year against an inspired Illinois team that fell just short in a 17-10 game.  In 2006 a number of players proved they were coming of age and had bought into Coach Zook’s philosophy; something that would pay off down the road. (more…)

(click here for Pt. I)

1986: My first Florida/Georgia game. My breath was taken away when I saw the inside of the stadium for the first time. I thought to myself, I’ve died and gone to college football heaven. I also remember talking to some guy outside of the stadium before the game started. He was complaining about the room he stayed in the previous night. I asked him which hotel he was talking about. “Hotel?” he answered, “I wasn’t in no hotel, I was in the Jacksonville Jail.”

1987: The coldest Cocktail party I ever attended. It was also the first time that I sat in the upper deck. I was so far away I felt like I wasn’t really a part of the game, and that’s just as well. The Gators scored a field goal early to go up 3-0 and scored a TD late. Besides that, there wasn’t much else for us that day. I awoke the next morning with a hangover that could’ve killed a mule.

1988: I’d graduated and moved to Maryland. I had to watch the game via some PBS station probably about 50 miles away. The reception was horrible. It looked like there were six teams on my screen. I’m sure the Gators thought there were six Georgia teams on the field that day as we lost 26-3.

1989: We had Emmitt and little else. Somehow we managed to hold the lead at the half (Even more shockingly, it was a TD pass that put us up). As the second half wore on I could feel things starting to slip away. I turned to my friend and said, “We need a spark. Something has got to happen!” Right then something did happen. The girl two seats over from me threw-up all over herself. That’s wasn’t the sign from the heavens that I was looking for. I awoke the next morning with a hangover that could’ve killed a mule.

1990: It was much colder this day than the 1987 game. But I didn’t feel a single chill. After three straight losses to the Dawgs, we crushed them 38-7. It was a great day to be a Gator and I’m not exaggerating when I say if we had taken advantage of all of our scoring opportunities, we’d have scored 70. Not only did I not want the game to end, I didn’t want to leave. I honestly think I was the last person to leave the Gator Bowl that day. I actually walked around on the field once all the cops and their dogs left. The next day I realized that hangovers hurt less when you win.

1991: Two days before the game a girl I knew asked me out to a concert. Michael Crawford, of Phantom of the Opera fame, was singing at the Kennedy Center that afternoon and she wanted to know if I would come with her. I told her that I didn’t care if the Beatles were reuniting and they wanted me to sing all of John’s parts, I wasn’t going to miss the Florida/Georgia game. I never saw that girl again. I did see UF wallop the Dawgs 45-13.
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Thanks to O&B Hue reader Jeff Brown for penning this manifesto. It’s a two-parter, but well worth the read. Enjoy.

The game is still days away, but I’ve already got that feeling in my gut… and my liver.

It’s a sensation that’s equal parts anxiety, nervousness and anticipation. Games against Troy or Middle Tennessee State don’t give me this feeling. Neither do games against Vandy or Mississippi State. What puts this damn sensation in my stomach is knowing that in just a few days my Alma Mater, The University of Florida will once again meet the University of Georgia on a football field in Jacksonville. Yes, once again it’s time for the World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party and like so many others before; this game will have major implications in regards to who will win the Southeastern Conference championship.

This year’s game has me worked-up more than usual. The 2007 Gators are an incredibly young squad and with inexperience comes unpredictability. True we are literally seconds away from being undefeated and possibly the number one team in the country, but this squad still scares the hell out of me. Maybe it is the fact that Gator losses the past four years have been excruciatingly painful. It’s not so much the gut-wrenching defeats in the game’s waning seconds that are killing me (they are giving me ulcers, loss of sleep, blood in my urine and heartburn, but not necessarily killing me). It’s the media that’s driving me nuts because they can’t seem to put a Gator loss to rest. Just when I feel like climbing out of my bunker after a tough loss I’m subjected to Pontiac Game Changing Moments, ESPN Instant Classics and Lou Holtz pep talks (Lou, if you really want to help, just buy me a drink and stop spitting on me). Hell, even when we get clobbered like we did a few years ago against Alabama; it makes the cover of Sports Illustrated.

For what seems like forever I’ve heard a lot of complaining coming out of Athens about the Gators having an open date the week prior to the WLOCP. I heard one guy, in all seriousness go so far as to say that the SEC should step-in and make it illegal for the Gators to have a bye before we play the Bulldogs. I wanted to tell the fellow that the conference is much too busy recruiting at the Jose Feliciano School of Instant Replay Officials to concern themselves with the Gators schedule. When they’re not barking like mental patients Georgia folks seem to have the market cornered when it comes to complaining about the annual game in Jacksonville.

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You think of the Tennessee-Florida game and you never think “easy victory.”

But did you know that Florida’s 30-year record over Tennessee is not too far behind their ‘total ownership’ of the Georgia Bulldogs in the WLOCP (World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party) series?

The Gators have won 15 games to Tennessee’s 6 in that span. (1990 marks the first year that the series was played annually.) From ‘76 to ‘85 the Gators won all four of the rivalry’s matchups. And from 1993 to 1997, at the height of Steve Spurrier’s demented powers, the Gators rolled Smokey uncharitably, winning games by lopsided amounts (31-0 in 1994 and 62-37 in 1995) before losing an OT game in Knoxville, 20-17, in 1998. The win fueled the Vols’ championship run of that year.

But in ‘99 and ‘00, the Gator victories continued. Coming into the 2001 matchup in Gainesville — postponed to early December due to the 9/11 terrorist attacks — Phil Fulmer had only managed two wins over the Gators during his tenure at Rocky Top. But he managed to send Steve Spurrier to the NFL on a sour note, winning 34-32. Fulmer also exorcised some Tennessee demons by providing the Vols with a win in the Swamp for the first time since 1971.

In 2002, Ron Zook shocked the Volunteer and Gator Nation alike by beating the highly ranked Vols in Knoxville. But in ‘03 and ‘04, the Zookified Gators dropped two consecutive games to Fulmer. Two wins in a row over Florida was a first for the Big Guy in Orange, and Tennessee fans ate it up like Phat Phil on a Krispy Kreme bender.
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From NWI.com:

Speed versus speed: When Florida defeated Ohio State last January in the Fiesta Bowl to win the national title, a popular theory was that the Gators triumphed because of superior speed.

But according to Illinois coach Ron Zook, who coached in Gainesville before arriving in Champaign in 2005, the perception of Southeastern Conference teams being faster than those in the Big Ten is misguided.

“In my mind, there’s not any difference,” Zook said. “We have every bit the speed they have in the South. There’s no question in my mind this league can compete with anyone in the country (in that regard).”

Er, excuse me?  Ron Zook?

You’d think the Zooker would have credibility in this department.  After all, he did coach in the SEC for a number of years (and not just as a head coach) before heading up to Big Ten country.

Unfortunately, the SEC team he coached was our Gators.  And he succeeded only in the “less with more” department for three seasons at Florida, while irritating Gator Nation with his incomprehensible statements and useless thoughts on college football.

And this is another one of them.  I’ll agree with one thing: “SEC Speed” is an overrated concept. While our conference is definitely the fastest top to bottom, there are fast teams outside of the SEC: Southern Cal, Texas, and Oklahoma come to mind.  But “Big Ten Slowness” is not overrated.  It was dramatically featured in last year’s BCS National Championship game as well as the Rose Bowl matchup between USC and Michigan.

Ron, the fact that in your ‘mind’ you have no doubt about the Big Ten’s ability to compete speed-wise is nothing less than another validation that the Big Ten IS slow.  Because you almost always get it wrong, buddy.  You have for the last five years.  And this is one’s no exception.