Gators take on Gamecocks
Florida looks to win two SEC games in a row

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Gators take on Gamecocks

Florida looks to put together a streak of SEC victories on senior day as the Cock Commanders make their way to the Swamp.

Gamecock coach Shane Beamer has his squad at 6-3 after going 7-6 last year. One of those wins was a 40-17 drubbing of the Gators that was the beginning of the end for Dan Mullen. It was the definitive end for Todd Grantham and John Hevesy, as they were let go after the game. But it was too-little, too-late for Mullen as he exited after the loss to Missouri just two weeks later.

South Carolina may have won six games this season, but their resume is much lighter than last year. Losses to Clemson, Georgia, Texas A&M and Kentucky were part of the 2021 campaign. This year, the Gamecock’s best win is probably a 24-14 win over Kentucky, but that was a game where Will Levis was out after taking some hard hits against Ole Miss the week before.

Last week brought a 38-27 win over Vanderbilt for the Gamecocks, which probably doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence in the South Carolina faithful.

Of course, Florida’s defense has had a way this season of inspiring the opposition’s confidence. And the last time Spencer Rattler faced the Gators he led an absolute drubbing in the 2020 Cotton Bowl.

Will the Gators get their revenge on Rattler for 2020 and Beamer for 2021? Or will the Gamecocks continue to flummox the Gators (Florida is 6-6 in its last 12 against USCe)?

Overall Stats

The first thing I look at these days when evaluating teams is the advanced stat Predicted Points Added (PPA). This measures how well a team does given the situation (i.e. 5 yards on third-and-3 is good but 5 yards on third-and-8 is not).

The Gamecocks have a PPA of 0.217 on offense compared to 0.280 for the Gators, so Florida has an advantage on that side of the ball. Additionally, South Carolina has a success rate of 42 percent compared to 41 percent for Florida. Essentially, that means that Florida and South Carolina have the same efficiency, but Florida is more explosive.

On the defensive side of the ball, South Carolina has a PPA of 0.156 vs. 0.234 for Florida (lower is better on defense). Both teams have identical 46 percent success rates surrendered, which means that each of them has the same efficiency allowed but Florida is giving up way more big plays.

We can see that in the raw numbers, as Florida has surrendered 103 plays between 10-19 yards and 48 plays of 20-plus yards while South Carolina has surrendered only 87 plays between 10-19 yards and 34 plays of 20-plus yards.

But what about when the offense doesn’t gain more than 10 yards? Typically, what that means for Florida is a second-and-8, as they have only allowed 37 tackles for loss and 9 sacks. Compare that to South Carolina who has allowed 64 tackles for loss (!) and 20 sacks.

On the defensive side of the ball, Florida has 48 tackles for loss and 15 sacks while South Carolina has 43 tackles for loss and 13 sacks. If you’ve watched Florida at all this season, you’ve likely been underwhelmed by the Gators’ pass rush. Expect to see the same from the Gamecocks.

Taken as a whole, you can see the contrasts between the two teams. South Carolina doesn’t get many explosives but doesn’t surrender them either. Florida gets lots of explosives but gives up a bunch as well. South Carolina gives up a ton of tackles for loss but Florida doesn’t get those consistently. The place where Florida has an advantage is that they don’t give up many tackles for loss and South Carolina doesn’t get many either.

That suggests that the game comes down to turnovers and QB play.

Quarterback

What do you get if you have Anthony Richardson without any real running ability?

Spencer Rattler.

The former Oklahoma signal caller has struggled, really, the last two years. He was benched in favor of Caleb Williams in 2021 at Oklahoma and now has a QB rating of 131.3 this year. That’s just not very good.

But it’s been even worse than that for Rattler if you look at his Yards above Replacement (YAR) stat, my proprietary stat that takes into account a QBs running and throwing ability. That number stands at -0.90 – we’re talking Feleipe Franks 2017-level play – for the 2022 season so far. The reason is pretty simple, Rattler has 49 rush attempts for 21 yards and so is bringing very little value on the ground.

Compare that to Richardson.

AR has a QB rating of 128.2, virtually identical to Rattler’s. But his YAR is 0.78 because he has contributed 488 yards on 74 carries (6.6 yards per rush). Even if you remove the Eastern Washington cupcake, Richardson’s YAR is 0.13, or above average.

What this suggests is that Florida has a major advantage at QB. Richardson hasn’t thrown an interception in three games and has been able to right the ship a couple of times when things haven’t been going his way. Rattler has yet to have a game this season with a YAR over 0.44 and only has had a positive YAR in 5 of his 9 contests.

Florida has an advantage at QB. If the Gators don’t differentiate there, it’s going to be a much closer game than the oddsmakers think.

Coaching

Last week, Billy Napier could have cost his team with the way he mismanaged the clock at the end of the half. It isn’t the first time he’s done that sort of thing this year, and eventually that’s going to bite the Gators.

Games turn in the three minutes before and after the half.

Florida had the ball at midfield against Tennessee with 3:42 left in the second quarter and a 17-14 lead. Other than a kneel right before the half, Florida didn’t touch the ball for 22 straight plays and went from up three to down 10.

The Gators had the ball up 16-7 against Kentucky with 4:12 left in the first half. Richardson threw an interception on third-and-3 and Florida was quickly going into the half only up three.

The Gators gave up a touchdown with 2:24 to LSU as the Tigers took a 28-21 lead. The Gators first play on the next drive gained 20 yards on a throw to Ricky Pearsall. But then the Gators basically ran out the clock to heave a hail mary from the LSU 44 rather than continuing to try to drive and get points. LSU took the opening kick off the second half down for a 35-21 lead and the game was essentially over.

Shane Beamer took over a 2-8 team from 2020 that had been run into the ground by Will Muschamp and won seven games with Luke Doty, Jason Brown and Zeb Noland at QB. The last three games though is a one-score win over Texas A&M at home, a 13-point loss to Missouri at home and an 11-point win over Vanderbilt on the road.

The fact that his team has gone 2-1, but in underwhelming fashion, is probably a testament to Beamer’s coaching ability. That team last year had no business winning seven games.

I like Billy Napier, but his teams played a ton of one-score games at Louisiana and have played four one-score games so far this season. The Kentucky and LSU games were 10-point contests. What that means is that the game is likely to be close, and if that’s the case, right now I’d rather have Beamer managing the clock/strategy than Napier.

Takeaway

PPA says that South Carolina should be slight favorites. The Gators defense has been so bad all year that it’s just hard to trust that it won’t turn Spencer Rattler into a star on Saturday.

Vegas disagrees with me. I’ve seen this game as high as Florida being 9-point favorites and as of this writing, the Gators are 8-point favorites according to ESPN. That’s crazy.

The Gators have wins of 3, 3, 7, and 17 against FBS opponents thus far in 2022. That 17-point win over Texas A&M was against a team with flu, injury and suspension problems, as well as significant motivation problems given its 3-5 record at the time.

I’m not downplaying the A&M victory. That was a big deal for Florida, but if you were actually watching the game live, you understand when I say that it might have been the second most frustrating Gators victory I’ve ever watched (9-7 over Vanderbilt in 2015 still ranks first on my board).

It takes a lot to beat an SEC opponent by more than a touchdown. Anthony Richardson will have to play turnover free. Florida will have to actually manage the clock right going into the half and coming out of the locker room in the second half. Spencer Rattler will have to buckle in the same way that Haynes King did last week to a enthusiastic, but flawed Gators defense.

I don’t see all of those things happening. I think the Gators are going to get their fair share of explosive plays, but I think South Carolina will be able to respond. The difference in this one is that Florida is going to pressure Rattler into an interception late to hold on for the victory.

Gators (-8) win, 30-26.

Picks this year: 6-2, 4-4 ATS