NY Times and Sporting News National Champions, too!
Let's not lose sight of the prize
- Thread starter MJWilliamson
- Start date
NY Times and Sporting News National Champions, too!
and it showed up again in the first playoff poll
Every team but us had that SEC bias rating while everyone is crying about it, while a Big ten team with a worse schedule than ohio state is ahead of us. It's an absolute joke and no excuse for it, look at their schedule and laugh...
Who does Florida want to play in the SEC Championship Game?
Andrew Olson
November 3, 2015 @ 8:55pm
With a two-game cushion in the SEC East and only conference games remaining against Vanderbilt (3-5, 1-3 SEC) and South Carolina (3-5, 1-5 SEC), Florida has all but locked up a berth in the SEC Championship Game. The Gators don’t get to select their opponent, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have a vested interest in the how the SEC West race plays out. The only team eliminated from contention is Auburn (4-4, 1-4 SEC) because the Alabama-LSU winner cannot finish worse than 5-3 in the conference.
LSU (7-0, 4-0 SEC)
Andrew Olson
November 3, 2015 @ 8:55pm
With a two-game cushion in the SEC East and only conference games remaining against Vanderbilt (3-5, 1-3 SEC) and South Carolina (3-5, 1-5 SEC), Florida has all but locked up a berth in the SEC Championship Game. The Gators don’t get to select their opponent, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have a vested interest in the how the SEC West race plays out. The only team eliminated from contention is Auburn (4-4, 1-4 SEC) because the Alabama-LSU winner cannot finish worse than 5-3 in the conference.
LSU (7-0, 4-0 SEC)
- Why the Gators want to play LSU: UF took LSU down to the wire at Death Valley, losing 35-28 on a fake field goal that went for a touchdown. Florida would have to like its chances to come out on top in a rematch on a neutral field. The Gators secondary would be extra motivated to make up for a mistake-filled performance on Oct. 17.
- Why the Gators don’t want to play LSU: Tackling LSU RB Leonard Fournette doesn’t get any easier in the Georgia Dome. Florida struggled to bring down the Heisman Trophy favorite last month. He rushed for 180 yards and two touchdowns on 31 carries.
- Why the Gators want to play Ole Miss: UF defeated Ole Miss 38-10 on Oct. 3. Florida does best against pass-first offenses like the Rebels. The Gators’ pass rush and pass coverage rendered the high-flying Ole Miss offense ineffective.
- Why the Gators don’t want to play Ole Miss: It’s difficult to beat any team twice. This time, Florida would be without QB Will Grier, who had a career game against the Rebels (24-of-29, 271 yards, 4 TD) and would be playing at a neutral Georgia Dome instead of being home in The Swamp. Also, Mississippi has OT Laremy Tunsil, one of the best offensive linemen in college football, back in the lineup. He was suspended for the first meeting.
- Why the Gators want to play Alabama: The sentimental reasons are plentiful. When Alabama beat Florida in 2009, the school’s last SEC Championship Game appearance, it signified the changing of the guard in the conference. UF lost the subsequent regular-season contests as well (2010, 2011 and 2014). There’s also the teacher-student matchup of Nick Saban vs. Jim McElwain. Most importantly, and actually on the field, Florida’s pass rush could potentially rattle QB Jake Coker.
- Why the Gators don’t want to play Alabama: Big, bruising backs like Derrick Henry (6-foot-3, 242 pounds) have been difficult for UF defenders to bring down. The Crimson Tide defense has shut down most SEC offenses since the 43-37 loss to Ole Miss, and Treon Harris (44-of-78, 695 yards, 5 TD) is no Chad Kelly (213-of-327, 2856 yards, 20 TD, 12 INT). Saban and defensive coordinator Kirby Smart’s familiarity with McElwain and offensive coordinator Doug Nussmeier, former Bama play callers, likely would be to Alabama’s advantage.
LaPorta Steps to Plate as Homecoming Mr. Two Bits
Matt LaPorta hit a school-record 26 homers as a sophomore and .402 as a senior.
By Chris Harry
GatorZone.com Senior Writer
GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- When Matt LaPorta answered his cell phone Monday night, he was pulling into the Citrus Park Mall in Tampa.
His wife told him to just throw on a pair of khakis to make it work, but LaPorta, one of the greatest baseball players in University of Florida history, figured one of the most famous traditions in Gators' history deserved more effort.
“I have to pay him homage,” LaPorta said. “I have to go with the whole ensemble.”
LaPorta, the only UF player ever to be named as a two-time Southeastern Conference Player of the Year, will do the honorary Mr. Two Bits thing Saturday when the No. 11 Gators (7-1, 5-1) take on Vanderbilt (3-5, 1-3) for Homecoming, with the SEC Eastern Division crown there for the taking.
He jumped at the chance to be George Edmondson for a day.
“I couldn’t believe it when they asked me,” LaPorta said. “I was like, ‘Oh man! Are you serious?’ I mean, my heart was starting to race a little bit. I’m not used to playing in front of 90,000 screaming Gator fans.”
But, he did quite nicely in front of rabid crowds at McKethan Stadium back in the day.
LaPorta, out of Port Charlotte, Fla., hit .323 with a program-record 74 homers during his four-year UF career, including 26 homers as a sophomore in ’05 and a .402 average as a senior in ’07, after which the Milwaukee Brewers made him the No. 7 overall pick in the MLB Draft. A year later, LaPorta was traded to the Cleveland Indians as part of the deal for CC Sabathia. While in Cleveland, he averaged .238, with 31 homers and 120 RBI through 2012. He retired from baseball in ’14 following his release by the Baltimore Orioles.
Now 30, LaPorta has settled in Tampa with his wife, the former Dara Altman (an All-American pole vaulter at UF), and their three kids (with another on the way). He’s a mortgage banker with SunTrust.
But Saturday -- on the same day the 2015 SEC Tournament Champion baseball squad will be honored for their College World Series run and third-place finish at Omaha -- LaPorta will revisit his Orange and Blue roots.
“The Gators are definitely still in me,” said LaPorta, who arrived at UF in ’03 with the athletic class that also featured Chris Leak and Lee Humphrey. “We’ve been fired up about the football team this season. I know we’ve had a few years that have been tough to watch, but this is a fun team that’s surprising a lot of people. I’m excited about this year and what the future is going to be like.”
Matt LaPorta hit a school-record 26 homers as a sophomore and .402 as a senior.
By Chris Harry
GatorZone.com Senior Writer
GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- When Matt LaPorta answered his cell phone Monday night, he was pulling into the Citrus Park Mall in Tampa.
His wife told him to just throw on a pair of khakis to make it work, but LaPorta, one of the greatest baseball players in University of Florida history, figured one of the most famous traditions in Gators' history deserved more effort.
“I have to pay him homage,” LaPorta said. “I have to go with the whole ensemble.”
LaPorta, the only UF player ever to be named as a two-time Southeastern Conference Player of the Year, will do the honorary Mr. Two Bits thing Saturday when the No. 11 Gators (7-1, 5-1) take on Vanderbilt (3-5, 1-3) for Homecoming, with the SEC Eastern Division crown there for the taking.
He jumped at the chance to be George Edmondson for a day.
“I couldn’t believe it when they asked me,” LaPorta said. “I was like, ‘Oh man! Are you serious?’ I mean, my heart was starting to race a little bit. I’m not used to playing in front of 90,000 screaming Gator fans.”
But, he did quite nicely in front of rabid crowds at McKethan Stadium back in the day.
LaPorta, out of Port Charlotte, Fla., hit .323 with a program-record 74 homers during his four-year UF career, including 26 homers as a sophomore in ’05 and a .402 average as a senior in ’07, after which the Milwaukee Brewers made him the No. 7 overall pick in the MLB Draft. A year later, LaPorta was traded to the Cleveland Indians as part of the deal for CC Sabathia. While in Cleveland, he averaged .238, with 31 homers and 120 RBI through 2012. He retired from baseball in ’14 following his release by the Baltimore Orioles.
Now 30, LaPorta has settled in Tampa with his wife, the former Dara Altman (an All-American pole vaulter at UF), and their three kids (with another on the way). He’s a mortgage banker with SunTrust.
But Saturday -- on the same day the 2015 SEC Tournament Champion baseball squad will be honored for their College World Series run and third-place finish at Omaha -- LaPorta will revisit his Orange and Blue roots.
“The Gators are definitely still in me,” said LaPorta, who arrived at UF in ’03 with the athletic class that also featured Chris Leak and Lee Humphrey. “We’ve been fired up about the football team this season. I know we’ve had a few years that have been tough to watch, but this is a fun team that’s surprising a lot of people. I’m excited about this year and what the future is going to be like.”
Ghost Hunter @hardcoremfr Nov 3
Rumors are the Florida Gators will be wearing all white helmets. With a Florida F on one side and a Gator head on the opposite. I'll take it
Rumors are the Florida Gators will be wearing all white helmets. With a Florida F on one side and a Gator head on the opposite. I'll take it
No no no nononononono!!!!!!!
Why ruin the damned white helmet with a gator head on one side?
Jesus. It figures. Wait for 6 years and this is what they give us.
From @SECNetwork
Most Consecutive Drives without a TD
1. Missouri 40
2. Georgia 28
3. Vanderbilt 25
4. Kent State 25
Most Consecutive Drives without a TD
1. Missouri 40
2. Georgia 28
3. Vanderbilt 25
4. Kent State 25
We are heavily involved in two of those streaks.
Let's make it a third.
Let's make it a third.
Hell yea! Any time we rock the white helmets I'm excited. Idk about the Gator on one side but I'm assuming it's one of the Nike pro combat helmets and those are usually pretty sick.
what jersey and pants combo are we mixing with that? I'd love to see the orange pants with that
Plus UGa gets Kentucky this weekend. Good chance Dawgs break that streak...maybe even before it reaches 30.
But the great thing about being a fan is how easily we ramp up expectations to the next level.
See? This is why we do it. oozie is only two year removed from being a player. The young guys love this shit. It is their team, their uniforms. Their game. This is the equivalent of your daughter dying her hair purple. You cringe, but so what? (I am speaking from experience)
I am OK with it. Or better said, I have made my peace with it.
BTW, we were 3-1 in October and UGA was 1-3.
At the end of October, if told that one team will end up 3-1 and one at 1-3, most people, including most Gators, would have switched the teams
At the end of October, if told that one team will end up 3-1 and one at 1-3, most people, including most Gators, would have switched the teams
A unique head logo on a helmet? Seems pretty dayyam logical to me. We ought to take pride in the fact that no other college team is named after alligators, unless one is willing to include the punny "Golden Gators" of minor-league San Francisco State[#]. It sure beats being 1 of the 3 redundant "Tigers" college teams in the SEC.
It would be a rare ITG regular who failed to notice, when venturing onto the Web sites of rival colleges, that the fans of certain college football teams are not especially literate; consider the obvious difficulty that so many fans of the Noles repeatedly have with spelling "Gators" correctly. It's amazing that a 6-letter word would be such a challenge to them, but no matter how you try to explain that, putting pictures on Gator helmets would probably be a big help to them; it'd enable the marginal--or worse--illiterates among their fans to distinguishing Gators from Syracuse Orangemen and U.Va. Cavaliers.
I'd put up with a lot of graphic-design awkwardness if it ditched Pell's wimpy toothpaste-script "Gators" logo, which could just as uncreatively, and every bit as nondistinctively, say "Dawgs" or "Noles". In fact, at one time or another, the Maryland "Terrapins" and "Pitt" Panthers used toothpaste-script logos on their own helmets, as I'm fairly sure the "Cougars" and "Beavers", of Pac-XX ne'er-do-wells Washington State and Oregon State (respectively) also did. Maybe even "Tulsa", the inexplicable Golden Hurricanes of the dusty Midwest. That's quite an exemplary roster of college-football national powerhouses, isn't it?
And let's get real and stay real about "the F": The newfangled spiky-serif slanted "F" was never used by UF for football in the 20th century; it didn't make its few appearances until Foley &Co. permitted some uniform vendor in the 21st century to promote it as part of an alleged "legacy" or "throw-back" helmet. Don't even think of arguing the contrary: 'Twas during Ray Graves' head-coaching reign (1960--1969) that a few forms of "F" replaced boring player-numbers on Gator helmets. Game photos showing the exact typography of the always-unslanted "F" on Gator helmets are fairly easy to find, especially when Spurrier played for the Gators.
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Note *: 1 of the institutions of the Cal State U. System, the state's 2nd-tier system (by design), whose Fresno State U. Bulldogs and San José State U. Spartans are probably more recognizable to football fans.
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A member of the California Collegiate Athletic Association, in NCAA Division II.
But yikes! They've gone whole-hog from "Gaters" to "Gators", and now have the audacity to insist: "Contact the Office of Sports Information regarding SF State Gator mark". Ummm, not sooo faaast! Your envious imitation is newsworthy here. I chose the logos that include "GATORS" in a scroll, to eliminate any doubt about what animal is being depicted, and hereby invoke the protection of the fair-use exemption for "public review and comment":
They're at <http://logo.sfsu.edu/sites/sites7.sfsu.edu.logo/files/Gator_3.gif> (150 × 130) and <http://logo.sfsu.edu/sites/sites7.sfsu.edu.logo/files/Gator_6.gif> (150 × 113), respectively, in case their images get, um, inexplicably disappeared from this reply.
But there's more!
- Women's basketball team photo posed in front of bleachers painted with the motto "THIS IS GATOR COUNTRY" (might UF have a trademark or service-mark for those motto-like words?);
- Official SFSU twit-account "@SFStateGators";
- Official SFSU hash-tag "#ChompCity".
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Florida has punched its ticket to Atlanta. The following numbers will change once we know who from the WEST will qualify
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