Florida shows mental toughness in imperfect win over Vanderbilt

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The final score in Florida’s win of 37-27 doesn’t quite capture the roller coaster of emotions during the game.

The most apprehensive moment was probably right after Vanderbilt rammed in its third TD of the day following a Feleipe Franks fumble.

It wasn’t just that Vanderbilt was up 21-3 at that point. After the turnover, the Gators defense gave up a first down on an offsides penalty and linebacker Vosean Joseph committed an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty worthy of the WWE (more on that later).

The potential to unravel was right there in front of the Gators like it was so many times last year. But this year is different.

While Florida self-destructed early in the first half with turnovers – and Vanderbilt made them pay – the Gators were always able to move the ball (5.3 yards per play in the first half).

On the other side of the ball, the defense surrendered an average of 3.5 yards per play on 23 out of the 25 defensive snaps. The problem was those other two snaps went to Ke’Shawn Vaughn for 43 and 75 yards and either scored a touchdown or led to one directly.

Even at 21-3, Florida was in the game. The Gators just had to stop shooting themselves in the foot.

Offensive Recap

Part of the Gators offensive frustration was tied to Vanderbilt’s strategy. The Gators first two drives of the game combined to take 25 plays. That was exactly what Vanderbilt wanted.

Florida’s offense this season has averaged slightly more than 4 yards per play when it doesn’t get any explosive plays. And by keeping things in front of them, Vanderbilt was able to limit Florida to just one explosive play in the first half (Lamical Perine’s 63 yard catch right before the half).

This strategy was apparent from the start of the game, when Vandy lined up with six men in the box. The safeties are aligned slightly offset, which does indicate a possible blitz (the safety does come up immediately in run support). But this is a look that screams “run the ball!”

Florida didn’t run the ball here, and Franks was able to find an open man. But it required hitting his receiver on a really tough throw because there wasn’t anybody open initially. In fact, Vanderbilt defensive back Allan George (#28) dives to break up the pass and nearly gets there.

As I went back to watch the first half, there were surprisingly few runs up the middle in the first quarter-and-a-half, especially when it wasn’t short yardage. It shouldn’t be a surprise that Florida didn’t hit a lot of explosive plays in the first half. You’re not going to hit big plays in the passing game when the opposition drops seven men in coverage.

This is the play when I knew Florida had made the necessary adjustments to start to turn the tide. Down 21-3, Florida began to drive down the field with a short hitch to Cleveland and then started pounding the ball up the middle. Running back Lamical Perine had just gone right up the gut for six and then four yards to convert a first down deep in Vanderbilt territory.

What you can see in the play above is that Vanderbilt had one deep safety in the middle of the field. They also had seven men in the box to stop the run. This meant they had decided to get more aggressive than they had been early in the game. It also meant that Florida would have one-on-one coverage somewhere.

Franks was unable to hit Van Jefferson streaking down the field, but Florida had finally forced Vanderbilt out of its bend-but-don’t-break approach and the big plays started to come.

That was the case here, when again Vanderbilt brought up seven men into the box. Franks looks toward the middle of the field, which freezes the linebacker and opens up the slant. Jefferson wins the one-on-one battle with the corner and takes it to the house.

Franks actually played well in the first half. The interception down on the goal line was the right play. He had one-on-one coverage on both of his receivers and the ball was tipped. It happens.

More promising was that he averaged 9.3 yards per attempt in the first half and 9.8 yards per attempt in the game. Florida was moving the ball because of Franks, not in spite of him. And just like he’s done all year, he kept chucking even after the turnovers.

Defensive Recap

As I stated earlier, the defense wasn’t terrible in the first half save for those two big plays. Unfortunately, those plays count and made this one a lot closer than it needed to be.

On the first big play, Florida didn’t contain the outside because of a missed assignment. Linebacker David Reese (#33) and defensive back Brad Stewart (#2) are in the same gap. Reese dives at Vanderbilt running back Ke’Shawn Vaughn and forces him outside. Except there isn’t anyone there and it becomes a big play.

Overpursuit killed the defense on the next drive as well. Usually you call a screen to counteract a blitz. The idea is to let the defense flow towards the QB and then you have offensive linemen in front of a running back with favorable numbers. That’s not what happened here.

Florida only rushes four. That means Florida should have the numbers advantage (they do). Corner C.J. McWilliams (#12) forces the play back to the inside (as he should). Now there are two defenders – linebacker Vosean Joseph (#11) and defensive back Shawn Davis (#31) – and one Vanderbilt offensive lineman.

Both Joseph and Davis overpursue and run into that one blocker. That’s what springs Vaughn for the TD.

The announcers on the broadcast made a point of focusing on Vanderbilt’s offensive production drying up once Vaughn went out with an injury. But Florida did a much better job of being disciplined in the second half, which is why I think they probably would have shut down Vandy even if Vaughn had been healthy.

Many fans may point to the dust-up between Dan Mullen and Vanderbilt coach Derek Mason as the turning point of the game. After all, the Gators were down 21-10 at that point and went on a 17-0 run afterwards.

But I actually think the turning point was at a different point in the second half. It appeared that Vanderbilt had weathered the emotional run that Florida had following the Mason/Mullen interaction.  Florida came out in the second half and had an immediate three-and-out. Vanderbilt took over in Florida territory and marched down the field.

Last week I pointed out that every time cornerback C.J. McWilliams was on the field, LSU targeted him. It was so obvious that Todd Grantham had to take him off the field for most of the game.

But McWilliams made what I think was the play of the game against Vanderbilt.

Florida runs a zone-blitz on this third-and-6 play, only rushing four and dropping Jabari Zuniga (#92) into coverage in the middle of the field. Vanderbilt has three receivers at the top of the formation and a really solid play concept.

The idea is to have the inside receiver (Jared Pinkney, #80) run straight down the field to occupy two defenders (done). Then the middle receiver (Trey Ellis, #36) runs a curl. The goal of his route is to run a “rub” where in a best case scenario for Vanderbilt, his defender (Chauncey Gardner-Johnson, #23) and the outside receiver’s defender (McWilliams, #12) get in each other’s way and both receivers come open.

The rub doesn’t happen because McWilliams has clearly spent time studying film. The minute McWilliams sees his receiver (Chris Pierce, #19) start towards the middle of the field, he bends around Gardner-Johnson to meet Pierce at the point of the throw, bringing him down three yards short of the first down.

Had he gotten caught up in traffic, Vanderbilt would have had Pierce in space with only Zuniga to beat for the score. That is a matchup that likely ends with Vanderbilt up 28-13 and a completely different type of game.

Instead, Vanderbilt missed a chip-shot field goal and the Gators took control from there.

Officiating

No summary of this game would be complete without addressing the officiating.

In my opinion, Vanderbilt’s offensive line was very aggressive in their interpretation of the holding rules. That the officials let that aggressiveness go is their prerogative and so long as it is consistent both ways, I have no issue with it. I thought they were fairly consistent.

As for the ejections of Vosean Joseph and James Houston, I think that was also the right call.

The NCAA has decided that it has to reduce head injuries as much as possible. I understand that the hit by Houston would have been celebrated just a few years ago, but under the rules now, Dare Odeyingbo (#34) is considered a defenseless player.

You can see from the view above that Houston does make contact with his head. You also might say that he did “crouch followed by an upward thrust to attack with forcible contact at the head or neck area, even though one or both feet are still on the ground” as the rule also states.

But I don’t think it even requires that jump. Houston made contact with the helmet of a defenseless player. As the rule is written, he should be ejected.

Hate the rule if you want, but I think it was correctly applied. I’m not sure Houston could have done much differently, but that isn’t the referee’s fault.

As for Joseph’s ejection, that was correct too. He had obtained a previous unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on the drive that put Vanderbilt up 21-3 because he essentially power-bombed his man. You’re never going to get away with that and I was actually a little bit surprised they didn’t toss him right then.

And while the announcing crew didn’t do a good job of explaining it, the reason he was ejected after the Mullen/Mason incident is because each team got a group unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. Because you can only have two such penalties, Joseph was ejected.

The logic behind this is actually pretty reasonable. That confrontation could have easily turned into a more serious incident and the game was definitely getting chippy. One way to calm that down is to give everyone one unsportsmanlike conduct penalty because then they’ll have to be more disciplined or face ejection.

Usually when we see this it comes in the form of offsetting penalties on two specific players and everyone snickers because it feels like the referees are taking the easy way out. But it usually calms those two players down because they want to stick around.

Regardless, to blame the officials when your team is clearly more physically gifted than the opposition is pretty weak. The Gators didn’t struggle because of the refs. They struggled because they didn’t execute the way they are capable of doing during the first half.

Takeaway

I was shocked at how quickly (on Twitter, at least) fans turned on the players as the first half progressed. The description of Franks being “trash” and the desire to bury Scarlett on the depth chart (who was averaging 4.5 yards per carry prior to his long TD run) are extraordinarily short-sighted.

The offense didn’t score points in the first half because it made mistakes at key times, but it was still able to move the ball pretty consistently. That doesn’t mean there aren’t concerns, but you would think that the recent run would have bought the players some good will.

A legitimate concern should be that Vanderbilt was able to force long drives early and that Florida couldn’t execute consistently enough to put a lot of points on the board. Florida only really scored after Vanderbilt became impatient and brought an extra man into the box.

If teams like Georgia or South Carolina can get away with six up-front, it could be a long day for the offense.

But Franks is the starting QB and he’s going to be moving forward. In fact, he’s earned that distinction and been pretty remarkable this season when you take into account how much better he is than last season.

While he has been roughly average (YAR = 0.06), he has outplayed every QB he’s gone against except for Terry Wilson of Kentucky.

Much of that has to do with the defense. But part of being an effective QB is relying on your defense if they are a strong unit. Franks has played about as well as we could have expected coming into this season.

He has made mistakes. He has missed reads. He has locked on to receivers. He has thrown bad interceptions. But he’s also won a lot of games.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised at the personal level of criticism. I was repeatedly asked last week why C.J. McWilliams was even in the game against LSU when the Tigers were continually and obviously targeting him.

I responded that he must have earned that playing time during the week in practice.

You see, there are players of varying skills and abilities. If you’re not Alabama, you have to make trade-offs and it means that there will be times when you get stuck in a bad matchup. McWilliams just got stuck in a bad matchup against LSU.

But he made the play that (in my opinion) turned the game against Vanderbilt. And he made the play because instead of putting his head down after getting pulled against LSU, he made sure he was prepared when his number was called this week.

Regardless of what happens the rest of the season, I have a ton of respect for McWilliams for what he showed on the field this week (not that he cares or should care what I think). And I can say the same thing about Franks after everyone was ready to bury him after last year’s performances.

And that is what I’m going to take away from this win against Vanderbilt. It certainly wasn’t perfect. But the team showed a mental toughness that was impressive.

Last season, the Gators fell behind and went into a shell. This year, the Gators always fight back.

This isn’t going to be the most talented Florida team in the Dan Mullen era. But it may end up being my favorite because it is fun watching teams that fight and claw for every advantage.

Saturday’s game against Vanderbilt  was certainly ugly at times. But at the end of the day, the only thing that matters is this:

The cocktail party is coming in two weeks, and it’s for the lead in the SEC East.

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