Florida v. Kentucky

by Arnaldo

Twenty-five.  That's how many consecutive victories the Gators have had over the Kentucky Wildcats. If you're wondering if it's some sort of record, it is.  The win streak is the longest active streak of consecutive wins over a particular opponent in an uninterrupted series.  The only longer active streak is Penn State over Temple and they don't meet every year (also, let's be real, that streak may be ending soon).

"Go Gators!" - Ronald Reagan (...maybe)

The year was 1986 when the Wildcats bested the Gators in Lexington 10-3, and I'm willing to bet most of you reading this weren't even born.  Ronald Reagan was president.  The Berlin Wall still stood.  Millions of Americans had just watched the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.  Have I made my point clear?  It's been a while.

UK head coach Joker Phillips
. . . Why so serious?

The University of Kentucky is really only a competitive rival in basketball, where both teams usually battle for the SEC East.  The football match-up is usually the final tune up game for the Gators, before entering the bulk of the SEC schedule.  There have been years when the Gators get put on upset alert against the Wildcats but end up scoring touchdown after touchdown, and we hope this year won't be any different.

As usual in this game, the Gators need to focus on the Wildcats and leave the bye week to prepare for No. 2 LSU, but I think I speak for all of us when I say it's nice to be home.  Usually around this time the Gators have already played at the Swamp two to three times, before the SEC expansion forced us to visit College Station.  This game represents a dominance over an opponent that we hope in turn represents our return to prominence in the SEC, and though the outcome is too close to obvious, the Swamp will be packed with fans welcoming their team back home as the No. 14 Florida Gators take on the Kentucky Wildcats.

The Match-up
 

Uhh... you mad?

Kentucky - Quite frankly, there's not much to see here.  This may be one of the worst Kentucky teams in recent years.  I'm not saying Joker Phillips isn't taking the team in a good direction, but after losses to Louisville and Western Kentucky (yes, the Hilltoppers), things are looking bleak for the Wildcats.  However, there are some bright spots on their team and as usual, they have potential to grow.  Kentucky's quarterback, Maxwell Smith is faring very well, despite the losses.  He actually leads the SEC in passing with 966 yards and 8 touchdowns.  His favorite target: wide receiver La'Rod King, who again, despite the losses, is quite talented.

Florida Offense - Against Tennesee, the Gators created a whopping 555 yards of offense.  That's the most in conference play since 2001 against Vanderbilt, and third most in Neyland Stadium by any team ever.  Jeff Driskel and the Gators found their momentum in the second half with several explosive plays and more suffocating defense.  What amazes me the most is the very noticeable growth of Jeff Driskel.  While it's still too early to tell how mature he's become, watching the touchdown pass to Jordan Reed last week, ignoring the two defenders set on taking him down really dropped the jaws of all the Gator hopeful.  He's come a long way from the scared freshman who played against Alabama and was almost immediately injured.


A First Half? - The first half at Tennessee was all too similar to the first half at Texas A&M.  Now, if I had to pick a style of team to be, it would be a second-half team.  But only in the sense that we play better in the second half than in the first; the first still has to be solid.  So far, the disparity between the two halves has been unacceptable. 

The coaching staff has been preaching 72 and 22, which are the total points allowed and scored, respectively, by the Gators in the second halves against SEC opponents in 2011.  This year's mantra has been "finish the game," and according to Frankie Hammond Jr. "We are a better second-half team. Over the offseason [strength coach Jeff] Dillman pretty much ingrained in our minds we have to finish out games."  So far this season Florida has outscored everyone 50-13 in the second half while pitching 27-0 shutouts in the fourth quarter, but finishing strong won't always make up for a sloppy first half.  If the Gators are proving they have the discipline and stamina to finish games strong and exploit tired opponents in the second half, there's no reason we can't see more production and fewer penalties out of the first half.  Playing half-games won't suffice against the likes of LSU, Georgia, and Florida State.

LT Xavier Nixon

Offensive Line - The O-line this season so far has been a bit of an evolution in the right direction.  From allowing eight sacks and providing reluctant run blocking, to the impenetrable sackless wall we saw against Tennessee.  The line has definitely grown in front of our very eyes, however, much more needs to be improved.  Left tackle Xavier Nixon was penalized with two 15-yarders, one from removing his helmet to argue with a referee, and the line provided Gillislee little support in short yardage interior runs. 


Injuries - Remember when I said Dominique Easley was at risk of aggravating his knee and he did towards the end of the Tennessee game.  His status is questionable, but with a soft Kentucky team coming in and a bye week before No. 2 LSU visits, I'd put my money on Easley riding the bench tomorrow.  Look for Jonathan Bullard or Earl Okine to fill in.  Jelani Jenkins is still out but is rumored to be looking forward to returning for LSU.



Tuning - No game should be taken lightly, ever.  With a bye week and LSU around the corner, players might have a hard time taking Kentucky seriously, but you can bet Will Muschamp won't let them get too distracted.  Kentucky is the last opportunity for any more tuning on the field.  It's time to try to finalize the ever shifting offensive line, iron out some kinks in the defense, and maybe work to perfect that new-look Trey Burton wildcat set. 


Arnaldo's prediction:

Florida wins 41-13

Florida v. Tennessee

by Arnaldo

"Rocky top, you'll always be home, sweet home, to me!"  ... Ugh.  The worst part of the "Third Saturday in September" is always sitting through The Pride of the Southland Band playing Rocky Top nearly 43 times.  And then there's the awkward moment when you find yourself humming the insufferably catchy tune as the Volunteers are walking out of the Swamp with Smokey's tail between his legs (this is not an impartial blog).


The Rivalry


... That never really was.  When I think of Florida's rivals, I think Georgia, Florida State, LSU, and sometimes Alabama.  What makes a great rivalry is competition and as you all know, in the last few years we've each beaten and lost to those teams.  Our streak against Tennessee is looking at a potential 8th year.  Only one of those games was even close.  The dwindling rivalry found its peak in the '90s, when Steve Spurrier and Phil Fulmer were each building the South's new reputation in football.  Danny Wuerffel was preparing a National Championship/Heisman run, while Peyton Manning was evolving into one of the best quarterbacks ever.  You know what he could never do, however?  Beat the Gators.

"You must hate me..."

 Spurrier loved to put down the Vols with quips like, "you can't spell Citrus without UT," and, "I heard they just hung a new sign outside the Citrus Bowl in Orlando: WINTER HOME OF THE TENNESSEE VOLUNTEERS."  The Citrus Bowl, now known as the Capital One Bowl, is usually reserved for the second best team in the SEC and was a common game for the Vols while the Gators were invited to more prestigious bowl games. 

"Umm... yeah... sorry?"

The departure of Fulmer and arrival of Lane Kiffen at Tennessee almost relit the rivalry.  Kiffen was doing all the right things: coaching up his team, bringing in his father the legendary defensive coordinator, Monte Kiffen, and trying his best to talk to a big game.  At his inaugural speech he said he was looking forward to Tennessee traditions such as "singing Rocky Top all night after beating (top-ranked) Florida."  He later publicly accused Urban Meyer of committing a recruiting violation that doesn't exist, and by doing so, ironically broke an actual SEC rule.  Urban Meyer responded by beating the Volunteers 23-13, purposefully not running up the score as expected, which was considered as even more of an insult than lighting up the scoreboard.

Albert changes his iconic
orange sweater for a blue
one against Tennesee.

As dull as the match-ups have been on the field, fans of both schools still love this rivalry.  In Gainesville, students spend all week making redneck/incest jokes while in Knoxville, fans are making the same jorts comments (presumably, I really don't care).  When the Volunteers come to Florida Field fans and students "blue out" the stadium to stand out from their opponents who share the color orange, albeit a dull and lifeless shade.  To fuel the game and add pressure, ESPN's College Gameday is following the Gators to Knoxville for a second consecutive week.

2007 "Blue Out" as requested by Urban Meyer.

The Match-up

As easy as it's been to beat the Vols in recent history, this year will be much different.  The Volunteers are ranked for the first time since week 1 of 2008 and for good reason: they produce.  They've had two back-to-back games of 500 yards for the first time in 12 years.  Third year head coach Derek Dooley is raising his program back into prominence and needs this statement win to prove he can make waves in the SEC, but then again, so does Will Muschamp and the Gators.  Here are my keys to the game:

Protecting Driskel - Last week against the Aggies, Jeff Driskel was sacked 8 times.  That's 7 too many in my book.  Now the problem doesn't necessarily lie within the o-line's protection; Driskel admits that he held onto the ball for too long on several plays, to which I say, "we noticed."  But bettering this is a two pronged solution: on one hand Driskel does need to make his pocket decisions much quicker, and on the other, the offensive line needs to understand that the young quarterback is still facing a learning curve and work harder on their blocks.



Tyler Bray - He's excellent.  I'd rank him fourth in the SEC after Aaron Murray (Georgia), Tyler Wilson (Arkansas), and A.J. McCarron (Alabama).  The junior quarterback missed five games last season but still racked up 1,983 yards over his seven starts.  Running a no-huddle offense, so far this season he's thrown for 643 yards and six touchdowns, and he hits the big plays.  Bray completes 76.2% of his passes over 15 yards and out of those six touchdowns, five have been on passes of 15 yards or over.

He also has great
taste in body art.

Even worse, Tennessee sports one of the SEC's best receiving corps.  Justin Hunter (11), who is coming off a three-touchdown game against Georgia State, and junior college transfer Cordarrelle Patterson (84), who has proved himself over the last two games with 360 all-purpose yards.  Luckily, returning star, Da'Rick Rogers transferred to Tennessee Tech last month.  Look for Muschamp to keep a nickel/dime package on the field most for most of the game and utilize our depth at secondary.





Turnovers - The Gators aren't making any.  I'll preach it every week until we start, but the critical piece missing in the Gators defense is turnovers.  It's hard to teach forcing fumbles or being at the right place at the right time, but what the defense can focus on is not letting the right opportunities slip through their fingers (sometimes literally).  Several potential interceptions were dropped against Bowling Green, and I do recall a fumble that was knocked to the sidelines for no turnover at College Station.  The offense can't capitalize off turnovers if the defense doesn't seize these opportunities.


Injuries - Texas A&M didn't go down without a fight, and they took Jelani Jenkins and Cody Riggs with them.  Neither are expected to return today, and when you combine them with the still missing Ronald Powell, the defense is getting thinner.  True freshman Antonio Morrison (12) will be stepping in for Jenkins, while the pretty deep cornerbacks group moves around to fill in for Riggs.  Mike Gillislee strained a groin running in a touchdown but is expected to play.  He, along with Dominique Easley and Josh Evans have suffered minor injuries in the first two games so they'll at some risk of aggravation.

Stopping the Run -  There's a defensive strategy in football that basically says, "slow down their best components but stop their weaker ones."  The idea here is, Tennessee is a pass-centered team with a good quarterback and great receivers, but there's no such thing as a one-dimensional winning team.  The Gators need to focus and slowing down Bray, yes, but by stopping the run, which they're more than capable of doing, much more pressure gets put on Bray.  Our decent secondary and fast pass rush should take care of the rest. 



Tale of Two Defenses - This is what we saw at Texas A&M.  The first half defense allowed the first three Aggie drives to end in scores and the fourth was thankfully ended by the clock.  The yards allowed for those drives are as follows: 66, 81, 79, and 44.  Yards allowed in the second half per drive: 8, 1, 6, 5, 9, and 22.  Impressed?  So am I.  Will Muschamp finally found something to motivate his defense and provide them with something they didn't have during the Bowling Green game or the first half at Texas A&M.  Like I said last week, these guys were top recruits.  They're out of excuses and it's nice to see they can actually stand up to their potential but in the end, it's a discipline issue.  There's nothing I can reference to prove they'll show up again today.


Arnaldo's Prediction:

Florida win 34 - 20

Florida v. Texas A&M

by Arnaldo

It's finally here!  The SEC expansion kicks off with the Gators playing the Aggies and the Georgia visiting Mizzou.  As I've said before, the rich only get richer, and the SEC, already the unquestionably toughest conference in college football for the better part of a decade, just got tougher.  Say what you will about the unranked Aggies and Tigers, but they're both quality programs.  It wasn't very long ago when Chase Daniel led the Tigers to a 12-2 season finishing at No. 4, or even last season when Texas A&M made Arkansas earn their 4-point victory. But expansion talk is over; as soon as the ball is kicked off, they're both one of us.


Aggies 101


We all know about Rocky Top, Woo Pig Sooie, War Eagle, and Rammer Jammer, because the SEC is a close-knit conference fueled by tradition and mutual respect/hatred.  We don't, or shouldn't, know much about our new programs.  So in welcoming in Texas A&M University, let's quickly review some of their traditions


The 12th Man -  The Aggies nicknamed their stadium "Home of the 12th Man" and their fans "the 12th Man".  The significance is of course, that there are 11 players on a football team playing at once.  Similarly, terms like "sixth man" are used in basketball.  The term came from the 1922 Dixie Classic, where the Aggies suffered so many injuries that head coach, D.X. Bible, was forced to call into the stands for E. King Hill, a football player who had recently left the team.  Hill came running down and suited up to play, but wasn't needed.  His ambition and readiness to serve the team are remembered as the "spirit of the 12th man".


Corps of Cadets and the Fightin' Texas Aggie Band - Texas A&M University is one of the six Senior Military College.  They produce hundreds of military officers each year and have a total enrollment of over 2000 Cadets.  The Cadets have their own section in the stands and are prominently shown on televised games.  The Fightin' Texas Aggie Band is no regular marching band.  They're exclusively composed of Cadets.  As the largest precision military marching band, their drills are so complex the computer programs commonly used to design them often return errors, and must be written by hand.  The members all dine together, sleep together in their own dormitories, and practice up to forty hours a week on top of a full course load and regular Corps training.  Both Dub and I are former members of the Gator Band and we were known for some complaining, but we were never literally in boot camp.


Bonfire - Since 1909 Aggie students have been holding bonfires the week before the final game (until this year against Texas).  Originally just a small trash fire, the Bonfire grew to enormous heights over the years.  Traditionally held around the end of the season, serious engineering is required to build a safe fire of over 50 feet.  In 1999, while constructing the 5000-log stacks, the top collapse and the chain reaction killed 12 students while injuring 27.  The university ended its official support of Bonfire and a memorial was built in its place.  Since then, off campus Bonfires have been built successfully with design changes to prevent another collapse.


Midnight Yell Practice - Texas A&M does not have cheerleaders, and they do not have pep rallies.  Instead, they have Yell Leaders and Yell Practice.  The Yell Leaders are five males elected by the student body to lead the various yells with corresponding hand signals.  In place of a traditional pep rally, the Aggies meet up the night before each home game, or two nights before each away game, on Kyle Field at midnight to practice yelling.  At the end of the practice the lights are shut off and everyone "mugs down" and kisses their date.  The dateless hold up their cigarette lighters to better find each other in the dark ... to kiss.  This is in preparation for their best tradition, "When One Aggie Scores, All Aggies Score."  During football games, when the team scores, the students kiss their date.  Are you asking yourself why you didn't send your applications to College Station, Texas?  Me too.


The Match-Up


Enough about them; let's talk about us.  The Bowling Green game had a lot of Gator fans shaking their heads in confusion.  To whom I remind, it was more of a preseason game than anything.  Unlike most years, where a finished product is brought onto the field, the 2012 squad still needed some live practice, and that's fine.  Yes, the Falcons tied the game twice, and I know, the team seemed very undisciplined.  What should you should take out of that game is this: it was a warm-up, and it was treated as such.  It's not at all uncommon for play-calling on both sides of the ball to get extremely conservative on the first couple games.  Teams don't want a lot of footage so readily available to their conference rivals.  Play-calling on offense was all run.  Mike Gillislee on the power; Gillislee on the stretch.  If you're worried at the lack of success that produced, don't be.  He got solid yardage against a team that expected all run and stacked 8-9 guys in the box.  Against better defenses not knowing what to expect and keeping 7 in the box, results should be comparable.  Keep in mind Brent Pease is also the quarterbacks coach.  You can bet his style of offense includes plenty of passing, though we didn't see as much last Saturday, which brings me to...


Jeff Driskel - Named the starting quarterback after the Bowling Green game, Driskel was just impressive enough to edge out Brissett but wasn't asked to do much.  The majority of his game were simple bubble screens and short routes.  As a down-field passer in the SEC, he remains a question mark.  A&M should expose a lot out of him, fielding one of the SEC's weaker secondaries.


Defense - On defense, conservative was still the name of the game.  From what I could tell, there wasn't a lot of tight man coverage.  There was, however, plenty of loose zones.  This means a defensive player is given more space around an area, or his assignment, to protect.  The result is a sacrifice of big plays for sure tackles.  We allowed the Falcons to pass the ball around much more than we will any other team.  By that same token, the players were probably told to not make plays on the ball, but instead focus on the receiver and a sure tackle.  Otherwise, we may have seen more interceptions.  The potential ones that were mishandled were more "right place, right time" than aggressively going for the ball.  What worried me about this style of play was its effect on the players' discipline, which brings me to...

He looks thrilled...

Discipline - There's no doubt Will Muschamp is strict.  He's even said there's not much more he can do to motivate or discipline the team.  What worries me are the results on the field: poor tackling, lack of drive, and lots of penalties.   When Jelani Jenkins wraps his arms around a player, that player (short of a Trent Richardson) should go down immediately.  As for penalties, the Gators stacked 14 last week.  That many flags this week could make the difference in the game.




Texas A&M - For the Aggies, this is a historic game for more than being their SEC debut.  It's also their season opener; their first game was postponed due to Hurricane Isaac.  This game also marks the debut of the new coaching staff under Kevin Sumlin, replacing Mike Sherman, and the debut of their new redshirt freshman quarterback, Johnny Manziel, replacing Ryan Tannehill.  All circumstances provided, it seems the Gators have the intangibles advantage.

Jeremy Brown in 2010

Aggies Pass v. Gators Secondary - Sumlin's air raid offense has the potential to disrupt the Gators secondary, however.  The air raid is exactly what it sounds like: lots of passing, which is something the SEC in general isn't very used to.  Even Steve Spurrier, our most pass-happy coach, admits the SEC forces him to run the ball.  The Gators secondary is well equipped for the raid but still remains unproven.  The biggest challenge will be keeping fresh bodies on the field, but with four rotating cornerbacks (Roberson, Watkins, Purifoy, Riggs) and the return of the skilled and sorely-missed Jeremy Brown (8), it may be pretty feasible.  Muschamp says he's prepared to have up to six DBs in often to counter-act the up-tempo passing attack. 


Aggies Pass Rush - Texas A&M led the nation in sacks a year ago with 51.  Keep an eye on the trenches as their best pass rushers, Linebacker Sean Porter (10) and defensive end Damontre Moore (94) return attack a much improved Florida offensive line.


Arnaldo's Prediction: 

Florida wins 24 - 21