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Central Florida vs. Florida Preview

Central Florida took it on the chin last week to Colorado while Florida was on a bye week. That means the 2-2 Gators have a blueprint for shutting down the 3-1 Golden Knights.

But the point spread on this game has swung from Florida being favored by a field goal to Central Florida now being favored by a field goal. ESPN has Florida favored to win 51.4 percent of the time. Essentially, everybody thinks this is a coin flip.

But is that fair? I mean, Florida is a more talented team, right? And the big, bad SEC should be able to handle the little brother from Orlando, right?

Let’s take a look at the two teams to see.

Overall Statistics

Against FBS opponents, Florida ranks 42nd and Central Florida ranks 24th in yards per play gained. The Gators rank 107th and the Golden Knights rank 99th in yards per play allowed. That is close enough that we need to look at each side’s schedule to gauge where one team might have an advantage.

Central Florida blew out FCS opponent New Hampshire (57-3) and a weak FBS opponent (Sam Houston, 45-14) before surviving on the road against TCU (35-34, TCU missed a last second field goal) and then losing big to Colorado (21-48).

If we use ESPN’s FPI ratings, Sam Houston is ranked 91st, TCU is ranked 37th and Colorado is ranked 28th.

If we compare that to Florida, the Gators have the same blowout against an FSU opponent (45-7 over Samford), the win over a weak FBS opponent (45-28 over Mississippi State), and then two losses to what are at least solid – and in Miami’s case, potentially excellent – teams (17-41 vs. Miami and 20-33 vs. Texas A&M).

If we again use ESPN’s FPI ratings, Mississippi State is ranked 70th, Miami is ranked 10th and Texas A&M is ranked 18th.

These are very similar teams with very similar resumes. I suspect had the Golden Knights played Florida’s schedule, they would be 2-2 coming into this one and had Florida played Central Florida’s schedule, they would be 3-1 as well.

Central Florida’s QB

Gators defenders should be very familiar with Central Florida’s QB, because he absolutely torched them in The Swamp last year playing for Arkansas. That player is, of course, K.J. Jefferson.

Jefferson had an underwhelming 2023 with the Hogs (QB rating of 139.8) compared to how he had played previously (QB ratings of 164.7 in 2021 and 164.9 in 2022). Jefferson is back to his 2021 and 2022 form through four games this season with a QB rating of 163.1 in Gus Malzahn’s offense.

But it’s not just the QB rating that’s important for Jefferson. He has always added value running the ball, but that also was muted in 2023. He averaged 4.5 and 4.1 yards per rush in 2021 and 2022, dropped to 2.8 yards per rush in 2023, and lo and behold, is back up to 4.3 yards per rush in 2024.

I wrote in our preseason magazine about how winning in the SEC correlates really well with my Yards Above Replacement (YAR) stat, which takes a QB’s running and passing efficiency into account. For YAR, zero is average, 1.0 is good-but-not-great, 2.0 is Heisman-level and -1.0 is poor. Here is Jefferson’s YAR over the past four seasons.

• 2021: 1.55
• 2022: 1.05
• 2023: -0.35
• 2024: 1.95

After only four games this year, Jefferson has been better than at any time in the past. We need to acknowledge that four games is a small sample size, but we also need to acknowledge that the outlier here is 2023, where he had now Florida coach Dan Enos as his offensive coordinator.

Even if we argue that Jefferson’s YAR will drop to be more like 2021 or 2022, that is still one of the better QBs in the SEC. And that’s someone that needs to be respected.

Explosive Plays

Explosive (20-plus yard) plays correlate highly with scoring (or allowing the other team to score). If you track any game, just about any drive that has a 20-yard play within it ends in some sort of points. That means if we’re looking at teams that are relatively close to each other, how they perform in explosives should probably guide our analysis.

That’s bad news for the Gators.

Central Florida’s offense creates a lot of explosives, ranking 12th in the country. Florida’s defense is one of the worst in the country at allowing explosives, ranking 104th. Conversely, the Gators offense doesn’t create a ton of explosives (ranked 82nd) and the Golden Knight’s defense isn’t great, but isn’t terrible at allowing explosives (52nd). Even in giving up 48 points to Colorado, the Golden Knights only gave up five explosives. Given how bad they are in yards per play allowed ranking (99th), that suggests a bend-but-don’t-break defensive approach that will require patience for the Gators.

Takeaway

In both close games that Central Florida has played in, the Golden Knights have had a per-play rushing average less than its yearly average: i.e. if Florida can slow down the running game on a per-play basis, they can slow down Gus Malzahn’s offense.

Jefferson has been way better this year, but against Colorado, he was much worse than in any other game. Not coincidentally, he threw the ball 35 times in that game compared to 14, 15 and 22 in the first three games.

This game comes down to two main questions.

On defense, can Florida stop the running game (including Jefferson) to make the Central Florida offense one-dimensional?

Controlling the running game sometimes requires bringing an extra man up into the box. But Florida is really susceptible to big plays, and the Gators play at safety even when playing conservatively has been abominable. That means the Gators have to stop the run with their front-four, which is a big ask given what we’ve seen thus far from the defense.

On offense, can the Gators take advantage of Central Florida through the air?

The Golden Knights rank 99th overall in yards per play allowed, but 28th in yards per rush and 96th in yards per pass allowed. That’s not exactly what a Billy Napier-coached team wants to do, but it is the weakness of the Central Florida defense.

Can Graham Mertz take advantage? Mertz was actively bad in the games against Miami and Texas A&M (especially early), but much better against Mississippi State. Obviously the Bulldogs just aren’t as good as the Hurricanes or Aggies, but it shouldn’t be lost on us that Mertz had an average depth of target (ADOT) of 5.1 against Mississippi State after having ADOT’s of 9.5 against Texas A&M and 11.7 against Miami. Essentially, Florida admitted that this is the best way to play with Mertz’s and the offensive line’s limitations.

That means that screens are going to be key to the outcome of this game and the games to come for the Gators. If those screens consistently put Florida in second-and-9 or third-and-6, there isn’t any ability to take deep shots and likely Central Florida will be able to get off the field. However, if those screens can produce second-and-3 or third-and-1, it not only gives the opportunity to take deep shots in those situations, but causes defenders to creep up to take away the screen and opens up the deep shots even on earlier downs.

To the first question, I don’t think Florida will be able to make the Golden Knights one-dimensional. This defense has struggled with running QBs and Jefferson is a good QB with the ability to be great in spurts. Combine that with running backs RJ Harvey (7.0 yards per rush), Peny Boone (6.4), and Myles Montgomery (7.1) and it’s a tall task to ask Florida to keep the Golden Knights much below 30-35 points.

That means the answer to the second question will determine the game. Can Graham Mertz hit the big plays that are available after dinking and dunking the Central Florida defense to sleep? He was able to against lesser defenses last year like Arkansas, South Carolina, and LSU.

Those defenses were better than this Golden Knights unit. That means I think Mertz gets the job done.

Gators (+3) win, 34-31.

Record this year: 2-1 (1-2 ATS)

Help the Helpers

Most of us who follow the Gators either live in Florida or have spent significant amounts of time there. And anyone who has spent some time living in the state has had to come to grips with hurricanes and the impact they may have on your life.

The same is not true of those living in Appalachia.

The images coming out of North Carolina and Tennessee, where Hurricane Helene caused such significant flooding that entire towns and major interstates were not only underwater, but completely washed away, are gut wrenching. Somehow it’s more poignant for me because these people never imagined that a hurricane would change their lives.

In a crisis, the PBS children’s star Mr. Rogers used to tell kids to “look for the helpers.” That’s great when you’re a kid and you need to know that the world has some good in it when bad times hit.

So when I saw images of the Unicoi County Hospital (Tennessee) and people being rescued off of its roof, that hit home for me. The helpers were in trouble. And while power will be restored relatively quickly to citizens and alternative routes will be carved out for folks who need to drive somewhere, people die when hospitals aren’t available to service them, especially in rural areas.

It’s easy to question whether a particular charity is good at delivering services or to worry about whether money you give will actually make a difference. And you should give to causes that touch your heart. This one touches mine, because I’m a firm believer in that in order to allow people to look for the helpers in an emergency, we have to support those helpers when they have a need.

You can support the rebuild at Unicoi Hospital here. Thank you.