“You know what FSU stands for, don’t you? Free Shoes University.” – Steve Spurrier
“You can’t spell Citrus without U-T.” – Steve Spurrier
“To the fans and everybody of Gator Nation, I’m sorry. Extremely sorry. We wanted an undefeated season. That was my goal, something Florida has never done here. I promise you one thing, a lot of good will come out of this.“You will never see any player in the entire country play as hard as I will play the rest of the season. You will never see another player push his team as hard as I will push everybody the rest of the season. You will never see a team play harder than we will the rest of the season. God bless.” – Tim Tebow
One needs a lot of guts to live in Georgia while donning Gators blue and orange. Nonetheless, I love the Gators football — sometimes too much and sometimes not enough. The quotations listed above represent passion and arrogance of the Gator Nation, but where has that swagger gone?
As with many rabid college football fans, life revolves around Saturday football. Heck, even my wedding date was driven by football! As a side note, we were supposed to win that weekend against Ole Miss. Let’s just say the bride was none too happy.
I started college in the last year of the great Emmitt Smith’s career in The Swamp. Gator Football back then was very much ‘give the ball to Emmitt and let him run’ — and run he did. He left for his Hall of Fame career in the NFL and was replaced by Galen Hall, who also ran well. And then of course was Steve Spurrier. Little did we know that this was the start of ‘The Swamp that Spurrier built’. The Fun and Gun was born and the spoils soon followed. Back then, it wasn’t enough to win–we had to win big. It was a great run until Spurrier left.
The Spurrier years were followed up by a painful, albeit brief, period ushered in when Zook, a former assistant coach, took helm in Gainsville. He was a great recruiter but hardly a head coach. The Gator howls started: “Get him out. We want to win!” So out he went, and the search was on. The much heralded Urban Meyer was found. He was sure to be ‘our guy’.
We all know that Coach Meyer delivered, creating spoiled Gator Fans once again. He came to the Swamp and won, with all of Zook’s players no less. Of course back then we did have a trump card in Tim Tebow. The Gator Nation couldn’t have asked for more. We had Tebow, Harvin, Cooper, Pouncey, and so many more. And with that talent, we won. Everything seemed like Shangri-La in Gainsville, but behind the scenes things were messy, despite winning on the back of several of the most dominant players in college football. They only masked a growing concern. But then Meyer turned his back on us; realizing the cupboards were bare, he had to leave due to health reasons, and to spend more time with his family. He knew what he had done to our football program – he had destroyed it.
As we enter the 2014 season, the fourth year with the Will Muschamp, things are hardly going well. Consider we had the opportunity to bring back Charlie Strong but instead chose Muschamp. Muschamp says all the right things but cannot back them up. Going .500 is not good enough. It should not be acceptable. Hiring Charlie Weis after his time at Notre Dame was nothing short of disaster. We should not be, in any given year, the third or fourth best team in the state of Florida! Our defense has been unbelieveable, dare I say, dominant. Defense wins games, but that only goes so far with an anemic offence.
So, Coach Muschamp, what do you have for us this year? Is Jeff Driskel ready to show his quality? Will he be mentally tough enough to not be crumbled by a mistake? Is Kelvin Taylor going to be as good a football player as his dad? How is our defense going to be? Can Kurt Roper make the leap from Duke to Florida just like the great ol’ Ball Coach? Can Chris Leak step up as a player’s coach to give them the intensity and passion that has been missing – with the exception of Muschamp’s antics on the sidelines?
Too many questions, I’m sure you’d agree.
I was talking to a well-respected college football Analyst about Florida football the other day, expressing my frustrations with the program. And you know what? He disagreed with me. He thinks that Florida is going to be much better than I give them credit for and that they should do well in the East, the less dominant of two in the SEC.
Bring it on, 2014 Gator football team. Let’s see what you have for Gator Nation.
Until August 30th, chomp, chomp!
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