Rough Times for Gator Nation

It was a rough game for the Florida Gators when we lost to unranked University of Miami. There isn't a lot of positive marks we can take from the game and as gator fans we can only hope our coaching staff will learn from the mistakes and come back even stronger against Tennessee next week.

When we look at the stats we see we had the ball longer, got almost twice as many total yards and attempted to have our first balanced game with passing and rushing being close to even. Of course all of us watching the game also saw the five costly turnovers, along with our inability to score when we entered the red zone for most of the game. Our defense had yet another stellar game, holding Miami to only 212 total yards and giving the offense the ball on the 10 yard line for an easy touchdown after a beautifully blocked punt.

Everyone has bad games and every team will find itself behind in a game, but we rely so strongly on our defense, we have only a scant plan as to how to score and score quickly. My heart melted  when with only three minutes to go and needing two score, the Gators did not seem to be in a hurry offense and even wasted time huddling on the field. Had our coaches already given up?  If so this is definitely not acceptable for those of us who bleed orange and blue!

Here are some lessons I hope we will take from the game:

•   One lesson we can learn is to try harder against easier opponents like Toledo. If we had passed more last week, then maybe we could have gotten some chinks out of our armor and won this game. 
•  Lesson two is be more imaginative with our play calling. The Gators plain Jane play calling is quickly becoming infamous and it gives other teams defenses a big plus when they don’t have to worry about the threat of the long ball.
•  Don’t just work at using up the clock, fast play can keep a defense on their heels and gives us the opportunity to come from behind late in the game.
•  No matter how awesome our defense is, they can’t beat a team once we are behind. We need a team that is capable of scoring, scoring often and scoring quickly. Did you see the pace both Georgia and South Carolina scored in their match up? As conference rivals, we have to play both of them, and neither will be beat with our defense alone!
•  Go deep. On second and one go ahead and try for the end zone. If we try it enough, it will open up other possibilities and just could end with a quick touchdown. Remember the Spurrier days when we always took the ball when we won the toss and often started the game with a quick touchdown?
•  Don’t settle for a quarterback who can run the ball. We need passing to compete in the SEC. Not since before Tebow’s senior year have we had an outstanding arm on our quarterback and used it to its full capabilities. We have had different head coaches, different quarterbacks, and different quarterback coaches, but we find the great throwing arm to be an elusive ghost that every other major SEC team seems to have in their arsenal.

Lets take a look at the final stats:
                                         

Florida Miami 1st Downs 22 10 3rd down efficiency 6-15 1-11 4th down efficiency 0-1 0-0 Total Yards 413 212 Passing 291 162 Completion-Attempts 22-33 12-25 Yards per pass 8.8 6.5 Rushing 122 50 Rushing Attempts 44 28 Yards per rush 2.8 1.8 Penalties 10-70 5-58 Turnovers 5 1 Fumbles lost 3 0 Interceptions thrown 2 1 Possession 38:20 21:40