By Franz Beard
A few thoughts to jump start your Tuesday morning:
SHOCKING LOSS? NOT EVEN CLOSE TO REALITY
To simply call Florida’s 69-54 loss to previously winless Texas Southern at the O-Dome Monday night shocking doesn’t even come close to reality. This was nuclear winter.
Armageddon comes to mind, but we’ll know more about that Wednesday night when the Gators (6-2) play host to a North Florida team that on paper is a lot worse than Texas Southern. The Tigers (1-7) played like they were the No. 20 team in the nation while the Gators resembled nothing like the team that earned its way into the rankings because of their toughness and physicality.
On this night, the tough and physical team was the one from the Southwestern Athletic Conference that earned the first win in school history over a ranked team from the Southeastern Conference. The Gators played like a team that didn’t want to be in the arena, much less playing a basketball game.
Let’s start with the basics. Texas Southern shot 54.4 percent from the field overall (31-57) and 45.5 percent from the 3-point line (5-11). The Tigers didn’t need to shoot many threes because they were constantly getting into the paint where they outscored the Gators 42-26. When they did launch a three it was typically late in the shot clock when they were trying to avoid a violation. Much to Florida’s chagrin, their threes were on target. The Gators, whose calling card was defense, were lazy and inefficient all night.
Now for the really tough part. Texas Southern outrebounded the Gators 46-23. How did they do that? They hustled. The Gators did not. Instead of blocking out and getting good rebounding position, the Gators were lackadaisical in their approach to going after the ball. Texas Southern beat the Gators to the basketball consistently. If there was a loose ball, they got to it.
The Gators shot 38.2 percent from the field overall on 21-55 shooting. If you thought the poor shooting from the three-point line was an aberration against Oklahoma (4-24), then think again. Only a couple of late threes enabled the Gators to shoot better than they did against the Sooners, but not by much. Florida was 5-24, a miserable 20.8 percent. In the last two games the Gators are shooting 18.75 percent from the three-point line. You don’t win many games shooting that poorly.
Additionally, the Gators were a poor 7-16 from the foul line and they had as many turnovers (10) as assists.
What was obvious from the outset was the Tigers had a good game plan on both ends of the floor. Offensively, they moved without the basketball and the result was 12 first half points on back door cuts. Defensively they pushed and shoved the Gators and unlike in the previous games, the Gators didn’t push and shove back. They let Texas Southern dictate the pace and the physicality of the game.
Texas Southern led 35-25 at the half, which was stunning, but the sparse O-Dome crowd had to figure that after a good tongue lashing in the locker room, the Gators would come out with enough energy to put the Tigers away. It didn’t happen.
“I was worried how we played for sure,” Mike White said about how the Gators came out of the locker room at halftime. “We got off to a start in which we, again, were fouling early, didn’t defend the glass, didn’t block out as well as we should have, didn’t rotate out of the post defensive situations we had, gave them some open threes …"
Brandon McKissic, who led the Gators with 15 points, kept saying post game, “That wasn’t us.”
No, it wasn’t the Gators we saw through the first six games, the ones who Ohio State coach Chris Holtman said were as physical and tough as any team the Buckeyes will face in the Big Ten.
“It takes a team effort and we just have to get back to the team we are,” McKissic said. “We have to get back to being us. Defense is the root of this team. We define ourselves on it. We have been letting offense dictate and we have to get back to letting defense dictate.”
We’ll learn a lot about the Gators Wednesday night. If the Gators play anything like they did against Texas Southern, it is probably a sign that we’re in for a very long season. If they come back and play with the kind of intensity and toughness we saw in the first six games, then perhaps we can write Texas Southern off as an aberration.
SEC Basketball
Tuesday’s games: Southern (3-5) at No. 10 Kentucky 6-1; Texas Tech (6-1) at No. 13 Tennessee (6-1); Jacksonville (4-2) at Georgia (3-5); Temple (5-3) at Vanderbilt (5-2); Eastern Illinois (2-7) at Missouri (4-4); Charlotte (4-3) at No. 12 Arkansas (8-0)
The Associated Press Top 25: 1. Purdue 8-0; 2. Baylor 8-0; 3. Duke 7-1; 4. UCLA 8-1; 5. Gonzaga 7-2; 6. Villanova 6-2; 7. Texas 6-1; 8. Kansas 6-1; 9. Alabama 7-1; 10. Kentucky 6-1; 11. Arizona 7-0; 12. Arkansas 8-0; 13. Tennessee 6-1; 14. Houston 7-1; 15. UConn 8-1; 16. Southern Cal 8-0; 17. Iowa State 8-0; 18. Auburn 7-1; 19. Michigan State 7-2; 20. FLORIDA 6-1; 21. Ohio State 6-2; 22. Wisconsin 7-1; 23. Seton Hall 7-1; 24. BYU 7-1; 25. LSU 8-0
The Coaches Top 25: 1. Purdue 8-0; 2. Baylor 8-0; 3. Duke 7-1; 4. UCLA 8-1; 5. Gonzaga 7-2; 6. Villanova 6-2; 7. Kansas 6-1; 8. Arizona 7-0; 9. Alabama 7-1; 10. Arkansas 8-0; 11. Texas 6-1; 12. Kentucky 6-1; 13. Houston 7-1; 14. Tennessee 6-1; 15. Southern Cal 8-0; 16. FLORIDA 6-1; 17. Wisconsin 7-1; 18. UConn 8-1; 19. Iowa State 8-0; 20. Michigan 7-2; 21. Auburn 7-1; 22. Ohio State 6-2; 23. BYU 7-1; 24. LSU 8-0; 25. Seton Hall 7-1
DAY ONE: BILLY NAPIER ERA
Napier spent the day on the recruiting trail, but while he was whizzing around the country, we got the first glimpses of what the Florida coaching staff will look like with the following announcements:
Patrick Toney, Co-DC/Safeties
Mark Hocke, Associate Head Coach/Strength and Conditioning
Jabbar Juluke, Running Backs
Ryan O’Hara, Offensive Analyst/QBs
Kyle Kazakevicius, Director of Recruiting and Football Logistics
Toney is a rising star in the profession. He’s only 31 years old but he already has a track record of success. He was the defensive coordinator the past two seasons at Louisiana.
Hocke came up in the Alabama system where he worked six years under Scott Cochran. He’s been with Napier for the last four years (they were on the staff at Alabama together). It says plenty that he was the associate head coach at Louisiana and will have that title again at UF.
Juluke was the head coach at Louisiana high school power Edna Karr. Two of his Louisiana running backs were drafted in the NFL and Elijah Mitchell ranks second among rookie running backs in rushing this year.
Napier calls his own plays and coaches the quarterbacks, but O’Hara will spend as much time with the QBs as anyone since Napier has head coaching responsibilities. He’s served as an offensive coordinator (Alabama A&M).
This is coming home for Kazakavicius, who played high school football at Trinity Catholic and wide receiver at Alabama. He will be the head of what Napier has already called an “army” of specialists who will try to bring Florida out of the dark ages and into the 21st century of recruiting.
YOU CAN’T TELL THE COACHES WITHOUT A PROGRAM
Mario Cristobal: After being linked to both LSU and Oklahoma, he left Oregon for Miami. It might have had something to do with the 10-year deal that will pay him $8 million a year. To get Cristobal, Miami had to first fire Manny Diaz, the coach of the previous three seasons who led the Hurricanes to five wins in their last six games after D’Eriq King went down with a season-ending injury. Diaz is a teensy bit bitter as you might well imagine.
Duke: George Edwards, who played for Steve Spurrier at Duke and was an assistant with the 1991 Gators, could be named the head coach at his alma mater. He’s currently a defensive assistant with the Dallas Cowboys. He’s been a defensive coordinator in the NFL with the Bills and Vikings.
Bob Shoop: He’s been the defensive coordinator at Tennessee, Penn State and Mississippi State. Now he will try to keep South Florida HBC Jeff Scott’s seat from getting too warm by taking over the defense next season. He spent the last two seasons working as an analyst for Manny Diaz at Miami.
Virginia: The leading candidate to take over for Bronco Mendenhall, who surprised everyone when he stepped down to re-evaluate what’s next in life after taking the Cavaliers to five straight bowl games is Anthony Poindexter, who has been either defensive coordinator or co-coordinator at UConn, Purdue and Penn State the last eight years.
HEISMAN FINALISTS
The four who will sit on the podium in New York when they name the winner of the 2022 Heisman Trophy Saturday are Bryce Young, QB (Alabama); Aidan Hutchinson, DE (Michigan); Kenny Pickett, QB, Pittsburgh; and C.J. Stroud, QB (Ohio State). Surprisingly the top four did not include Michigan State running back Kenneth Walker III and Ole Miss quarterback Matt Corral.
It will be one of the major upsets in Heisman Trophy history if the winner Saturday is anyone other than Young, who led Alabama to the SEC title and the No. 1 seed in the College Football Playoff while throwing for 4,322 yards and 43 touchdowns.
COUNTDOWN TO FIRING DAY: REGULAR SEASON OVER
Extinct Species List
Les Miles, Kansas (Permanent replacement Lance Leipold)
Randy Edsall, UConn (Permanent replacement Jim Mora Jr.)
Clay Helton, Southern Cal (Permanent replacement Lincoln Riley)
Chad Lunsford, Georgia Southern (Permanent replacement Clay Helton)
Ed Orgeron, LSU (Permanent replacement Brian Kelly)
Nick Rolovich, Washington State (Permanent replacement Jack Dickert)
Matt Wells, Texas Tech (Permanent replacement Joey McGuire)
Gary Patterson, TCU (Permanent replacement Sonny Dykes)
Tom Arth, Akron (Permanent replacement Joe Moorhead)
Walt Bell, UMass (Permanent replacement Don Brown)
Jimmy Lake, Washington (Permanent replacement Kalen DeBoer)
Butch Davis, Florida International
Justin Fuente, Virginia Tech (Permanent replacement Brent Pry)
Chip Lindsey, Troy (Permanent replacement Jon Sumrall)
Dan Mullen, Florida (Permanent replacement Billy Napier)
Doug Martin, New Mexico State (Permanent replacement Jerry Kill)
Rod Carey, Temple
Skip Holtz, Louisiana Tech (Permanent replacement Sonny Cumbie)
David Cutcliffe, Duke
Steve Addazio, Colorado State
Manny Diaz, Miami (Permanent replacement Mario Cristobal)
On Life Support
Scot Loeffler, Bowling Green: He’s still hanging on by a thread, but it’s possible he survives.
Mike Bloomgren, Rice: Academics are tougher than Stanford. You don’t win football games with Boy Scouts and MENSA candidates. Who are they going to get that’s better?
Endangered Species List
Geoff Collins, Georgia Tech: He’s getting another year. He hired former Notre Dame OC Chip Long to transform an offense that stinks.
Steve Sarkisian, Texas: He’ll get a second year even though boosters would gladly write the checks to fire him. Only God has more money than the Longhorns.
Dino Babers, Syracuse: Anything less than seven wins next year and he’s unemployed.
Chip Kelly, UCLA: At 8-4 everyone is happy, but now he has to contend with Lincoln Riley at USC.
Seth Littrell, North Texas: A 5-game winning streak and a bowl game saved his hide. Now can he do a repeat performance next year.
Phil Montgomery, Tulsa: He’s going bowling, otherwise he would be a goner.
ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: There is something seriously wrong with both the transfer portal and the way we’re hiring coaches. A good example is Washington naming Fresno State’s Kalen DeBoer as its new head coach to replace the fired Jimmy Lake. DeBoer is a fine coach who led Fresno State to a 9-3 record and a bowl game. As soon as DeBoer took the Washington job, quarterback Jake Haener (3,810 passing yards, 32 TDPs) put his name in the transfer portal and announced for Washington. So Fresno State will play UTEP in the New Mexico Bowl on December 18 minus the coach who led the team and the quarterback who made the offense dynamic. If the bowls are supposed to be a reward for teams that do well, then the kids who sacrificed and worked so hard all year should be given a legitimate chance to win the games instead of working with skeleton coaching staffs and players who can transfer at any point. This is not the way the system is supposed to work and it needs to be tweaked.
A few thoughts to jump start your Tuesday morning:
SHOCKING LOSS? NOT EVEN CLOSE TO REALITY
To simply call Florida’s 69-54 loss to previously winless Texas Southern at the O-Dome Monday night shocking doesn’t even come close to reality. This was nuclear winter.
Armageddon comes to mind, but we’ll know more about that Wednesday night when the Gators (6-2) play host to a North Florida team that on paper is a lot worse than Texas Southern. The Tigers (1-7) played like they were the No. 20 team in the nation while the Gators resembled nothing like the team that earned its way into the rankings because of their toughness and physicality.
On this night, the tough and physical team was the one from the Southwestern Athletic Conference that earned the first win in school history over a ranked team from the Southeastern Conference. The Gators played like a team that didn’t want to be in the arena, much less playing a basketball game.
Let’s start with the basics. Texas Southern shot 54.4 percent from the field overall (31-57) and 45.5 percent from the 3-point line (5-11). The Tigers didn’t need to shoot many threes because they were constantly getting into the paint where they outscored the Gators 42-26. When they did launch a three it was typically late in the shot clock when they were trying to avoid a violation. Much to Florida’s chagrin, their threes were on target. The Gators, whose calling card was defense, were lazy and inefficient all night.
Now for the really tough part. Texas Southern outrebounded the Gators 46-23. How did they do that? They hustled. The Gators did not. Instead of blocking out and getting good rebounding position, the Gators were lackadaisical in their approach to going after the ball. Texas Southern beat the Gators to the basketball consistently. If there was a loose ball, they got to it.
The Gators shot 38.2 percent from the field overall on 21-55 shooting. If you thought the poor shooting from the three-point line was an aberration against Oklahoma (4-24), then think again. Only a couple of late threes enabled the Gators to shoot better than they did against the Sooners, but not by much. Florida was 5-24, a miserable 20.8 percent. In the last two games the Gators are shooting 18.75 percent from the three-point line. You don’t win many games shooting that poorly.
Additionally, the Gators were a poor 7-16 from the foul line and they had as many turnovers (10) as assists.
What was obvious from the outset was the Tigers had a good game plan on both ends of the floor. Offensively, they moved without the basketball and the result was 12 first half points on back door cuts. Defensively they pushed and shoved the Gators and unlike in the previous games, the Gators didn’t push and shove back. They let Texas Southern dictate the pace and the physicality of the game.
Texas Southern led 35-25 at the half, which was stunning, but the sparse O-Dome crowd had to figure that after a good tongue lashing in the locker room, the Gators would come out with enough energy to put the Tigers away. It didn’t happen.
“I was worried how we played for sure,” Mike White said about how the Gators came out of the locker room at halftime. “We got off to a start in which we, again, were fouling early, didn’t defend the glass, didn’t block out as well as we should have, didn’t rotate out of the post defensive situations we had, gave them some open threes …"
Brandon McKissic, who led the Gators with 15 points, kept saying post game, “That wasn’t us.”
No, it wasn’t the Gators we saw through the first six games, the ones who Ohio State coach Chris Holtman said were as physical and tough as any team the Buckeyes will face in the Big Ten.
“It takes a team effort and we just have to get back to the team we are,” McKissic said. “We have to get back to being us. Defense is the root of this team. We define ourselves on it. We have been letting offense dictate and we have to get back to letting defense dictate.”
We’ll learn a lot about the Gators Wednesday night. If the Gators play anything like they did against Texas Southern, it is probably a sign that we’re in for a very long season. If they come back and play with the kind of intensity and toughness we saw in the first six games, then perhaps we can write Texas Southern off as an aberration.
SEC Basketball
Tuesday’s games: Southern (3-5) at No. 10 Kentucky 6-1; Texas Tech (6-1) at No. 13 Tennessee (6-1); Jacksonville (4-2) at Georgia (3-5); Temple (5-3) at Vanderbilt (5-2); Eastern Illinois (2-7) at Missouri (4-4); Charlotte (4-3) at No. 12 Arkansas (8-0)
The Associated Press Top 25: 1. Purdue 8-0; 2. Baylor 8-0; 3. Duke 7-1; 4. UCLA 8-1; 5. Gonzaga 7-2; 6. Villanova 6-2; 7. Texas 6-1; 8. Kansas 6-1; 9. Alabama 7-1; 10. Kentucky 6-1; 11. Arizona 7-0; 12. Arkansas 8-0; 13. Tennessee 6-1; 14. Houston 7-1; 15. UConn 8-1; 16. Southern Cal 8-0; 17. Iowa State 8-0; 18. Auburn 7-1; 19. Michigan State 7-2; 20. FLORIDA 6-1; 21. Ohio State 6-2; 22. Wisconsin 7-1; 23. Seton Hall 7-1; 24. BYU 7-1; 25. LSU 8-0
The Coaches Top 25: 1. Purdue 8-0; 2. Baylor 8-0; 3. Duke 7-1; 4. UCLA 8-1; 5. Gonzaga 7-2; 6. Villanova 6-2; 7. Kansas 6-1; 8. Arizona 7-0; 9. Alabama 7-1; 10. Arkansas 8-0; 11. Texas 6-1; 12. Kentucky 6-1; 13. Houston 7-1; 14. Tennessee 6-1; 15. Southern Cal 8-0; 16. FLORIDA 6-1; 17. Wisconsin 7-1; 18. UConn 8-1; 19. Iowa State 8-0; 20. Michigan 7-2; 21. Auburn 7-1; 22. Ohio State 6-2; 23. BYU 7-1; 24. LSU 8-0; 25. Seton Hall 7-1
DAY ONE: BILLY NAPIER ERA
Napier spent the day on the recruiting trail, but while he was whizzing around the country, we got the first glimpses of what the Florida coaching staff will look like with the following announcements:
Patrick Toney, Co-DC/Safeties
Mark Hocke, Associate Head Coach/Strength and Conditioning
Jabbar Juluke, Running Backs
Ryan O’Hara, Offensive Analyst/QBs
Kyle Kazakevicius, Director of Recruiting and Football Logistics
Toney is a rising star in the profession. He’s only 31 years old but he already has a track record of success. He was the defensive coordinator the past two seasons at Louisiana.
Hocke came up in the Alabama system where he worked six years under Scott Cochran. He’s been with Napier for the last four years (they were on the staff at Alabama together). It says plenty that he was the associate head coach at Louisiana and will have that title again at UF.
Juluke was the head coach at Louisiana high school power Edna Karr. Two of his Louisiana running backs were drafted in the NFL and Elijah Mitchell ranks second among rookie running backs in rushing this year.
Napier calls his own plays and coaches the quarterbacks, but O’Hara will spend as much time with the QBs as anyone since Napier has head coaching responsibilities. He’s served as an offensive coordinator (Alabama A&M).
This is coming home for Kazakavicius, who played high school football at Trinity Catholic and wide receiver at Alabama. He will be the head of what Napier has already called an “army” of specialists who will try to bring Florida out of the dark ages and into the 21st century of recruiting.
YOU CAN’T TELL THE COACHES WITHOUT A PROGRAM
Mario Cristobal: After being linked to both LSU and Oklahoma, he left Oregon for Miami. It might have had something to do with the 10-year deal that will pay him $8 million a year. To get Cristobal, Miami had to first fire Manny Diaz, the coach of the previous three seasons who led the Hurricanes to five wins in their last six games after D’Eriq King went down with a season-ending injury. Diaz is a teensy bit bitter as you might well imagine.
Duke: George Edwards, who played for Steve Spurrier at Duke and was an assistant with the 1991 Gators, could be named the head coach at his alma mater. He’s currently a defensive assistant with the Dallas Cowboys. He’s been a defensive coordinator in the NFL with the Bills and Vikings.
Bob Shoop: He’s been the defensive coordinator at Tennessee, Penn State and Mississippi State. Now he will try to keep South Florida HBC Jeff Scott’s seat from getting too warm by taking over the defense next season. He spent the last two seasons working as an analyst for Manny Diaz at Miami.
Virginia: The leading candidate to take over for Bronco Mendenhall, who surprised everyone when he stepped down to re-evaluate what’s next in life after taking the Cavaliers to five straight bowl games is Anthony Poindexter, who has been either defensive coordinator or co-coordinator at UConn, Purdue and Penn State the last eight years.
HEISMAN FINALISTS
The four who will sit on the podium in New York when they name the winner of the 2022 Heisman Trophy Saturday are Bryce Young, QB (Alabama); Aidan Hutchinson, DE (Michigan); Kenny Pickett, QB, Pittsburgh; and C.J. Stroud, QB (Ohio State). Surprisingly the top four did not include Michigan State running back Kenneth Walker III and Ole Miss quarterback Matt Corral.
It will be one of the major upsets in Heisman Trophy history if the winner Saturday is anyone other than Young, who led Alabama to the SEC title and the No. 1 seed in the College Football Playoff while throwing for 4,322 yards and 43 touchdowns.
COUNTDOWN TO FIRING DAY: REGULAR SEASON OVER
Extinct Species List
Les Miles, Kansas (Permanent replacement Lance Leipold)
Randy Edsall, UConn (Permanent replacement Jim Mora Jr.)
Clay Helton, Southern Cal (Permanent replacement Lincoln Riley)
Chad Lunsford, Georgia Southern (Permanent replacement Clay Helton)
Ed Orgeron, LSU (Permanent replacement Brian Kelly)
Nick Rolovich, Washington State (Permanent replacement Jack Dickert)
Matt Wells, Texas Tech (Permanent replacement Joey McGuire)
Gary Patterson, TCU (Permanent replacement Sonny Dykes)
Tom Arth, Akron (Permanent replacement Joe Moorhead)
Walt Bell, UMass (Permanent replacement Don Brown)
Jimmy Lake, Washington (Permanent replacement Kalen DeBoer)
Butch Davis, Florida International
Justin Fuente, Virginia Tech (Permanent replacement Brent Pry)
Chip Lindsey, Troy (Permanent replacement Jon Sumrall)
Dan Mullen, Florida (Permanent replacement Billy Napier)
Doug Martin, New Mexico State (Permanent replacement Jerry Kill)
Rod Carey, Temple
Skip Holtz, Louisiana Tech (Permanent replacement Sonny Cumbie)
David Cutcliffe, Duke
Steve Addazio, Colorado State
Manny Diaz, Miami (Permanent replacement Mario Cristobal)
On Life Support
Scot Loeffler, Bowling Green: He’s still hanging on by a thread, but it’s possible he survives.
Mike Bloomgren, Rice: Academics are tougher than Stanford. You don’t win football games with Boy Scouts and MENSA candidates. Who are they going to get that’s better?
Endangered Species List
Geoff Collins, Georgia Tech: He’s getting another year. He hired former Notre Dame OC Chip Long to transform an offense that stinks.
Steve Sarkisian, Texas: He’ll get a second year even though boosters would gladly write the checks to fire him. Only God has more money than the Longhorns.
Dino Babers, Syracuse: Anything less than seven wins next year and he’s unemployed.
Chip Kelly, UCLA: At 8-4 everyone is happy, but now he has to contend with Lincoln Riley at USC.
Seth Littrell, North Texas: A 5-game winning streak and a bowl game saved his hide. Now can he do a repeat performance next year.
Phil Montgomery, Tulsa: He’s going bowling, otherwise he would be a goner.
ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: There is something seriously wrong with both the transfer portal and the way we’re hiring coaches. A good example is Washington naming Fresno State’s Kalen DeBoer as its new head coach to replace the fired Jimmy Lake. DeBoer is a fine coach who led Fresno State to a 9-3 record and a bowl game. As soon as DeBoer took the Washington job, quarterback Jake Haener (3,810 passing yards, 32 TDPs) put his name in the transfer portal and announced for Washington. So Fresno State will play UTEP in the New Mexico Bowl on December 18 minus the coach who led the team and the quarterback who made the offense dynamic. If the bowls are supposed to be a reward for teams that do well, then the kids who sacrificed and worked so hard all year should be given a legitimate chance to win the games instead of working with skeleton coaching staffs and players who can transfer at any point. This is not the way the system is supposed to work and it needs to be tweaked.
