Gators lose to Tennessee in mistake-filled game
Whenever Florida has played decent teams this year, they’ve been blown out. But after an overtime loss to Tennessee on Saturday night, perhaps those blowouts are a more humane way to lose.
This was just excruciating. Over and over Florida had an opportunity to put their foot on the Vols’ necks, but instead they allowed Tennessee the ability to hang around long enough to be able to pull it out at the end.
Florida had five drives in the first half and scored three points. Normally that would mean Tennessee’s defense had played well, but that wasn’t the case as Florida averaged 5.5 yards per play and spent a bulk of its time in Tennessee territory.
In his post-game press conference, Napier talked about leaving points on the field. I wish I could break down the defensive performance given how good they were in this one, but it’s the miscues that stand out and the ones that we’ll break down here.
Drive 1
The miscues started early, as Napier decided to punt on fourth-and-4 from the Tennessee 44 yard-line on the Gators opening drive. I know people are going to focus on the other drives with the more obvious gaffes, but this is where it starts.
I ripped Napier for his fourth down decision-making against Miami, where he decided to punt on fourth-and-6 from the Miami 41-yard line down 7-0 and then went for it on fourth-and-5 from the Miami 42-yard line trailing 10-3.
Those decisions against Miami were set up on a check-down on the first situation and a third-and-5 run on the second. Tonight, Florida had third-and-11 and here was the play.
On this play, Mertz makes the right read. Florida is trying to attack the single-high safety that Tennessee is showing with two routes for its inside receivers that attack the seams. But at the snap, Tennessee’s other safety drops back into a middle of the field open (MOFO) coverage, essentially taking away the seams.
Mertz throwing to Boardingham over the middle is the correct play. He does throw it behind Boardingham, making him stop and jump and ensuring he doesn’t get the first down, but I’m not sure he would have gotten it with a perfectly executed pass given where Tennessee’s defenders were.
My criticism here is the play design. Elijhah Badger (#6) is the slot receiver to the bottom of the screen who is running one of the seam routes. I’m not sure why he doesn’t have an option to run a corner route (towards the sideline) if that safety drops. It would give Mertz a deep option to at least attempt to get a first down.
And that’s because if you’re going to punt on fourth-and-4 from the 44, you’re going to punt on fourth-and-11 from your own 49. You gain almost nothing from the 5-yard gain to Boardingham unless you’re going to go for it on fourth down. Otherwise, it’s just a wasted opportunity.
Drive 2
Okay, so Florida punted on the last drive but was able to get the ball back at their own 49 after stopping the Vols. The Gators were then able to move the ball to the Tennessee 20-yard line and set up a third-and-1.
If you’re mad about the end around to Tre Wilson coming on the next drive, you need to pay special attention to what happened on this play.
Florida brings Chimere Dike in motion. When they do, the corner follows him, which leaves eight men in the box for the Vols. The outside linebacker (Will Brooks, #35) pays zero attention to Dike. That leaves Florida at a numbers disadvantage, with seven men blocking and eight defenders.
The Vol defender who crashes through does so because he is pushed by a linebacker coming down full-tilt. Damieon Georga (#70) should be able to hold up better and help his back (Jadan Baugh) get a yard, but I guarantee this was in Florida’s head on the next drive.
Drive 3
Now we get to the interesting stuff.
Florida had driven 72 yards on 10 plays and had essentially settled for a field goal as D.J. Lagway completed a screen pass out to Montrell Johnson. But Johnson had better ideas, juking a couple of Tennessee defenders and running over a couple more to set up fourth-and-inches.
The “inches” part is where the criticism of Napier is valid. It was a full yard when Baugh was stuffed on the last drive. This is literally the QB just has to not fall backwards on a sneak to get the first down, and everybody – including the announcers – were citing Lagway’s size as a reason to sneak it.
That is the safe call (at least, we thought it was at this point), but I think we should look at the tape again to see what Florida’s coaches saw and take that into account.
It’s the same thing we saw on the last short-yardage play. This time Tre Wilson comes in motion and the corner responsible for him follows (Ricky Gibson, #1). That leaves Tennessee with a numbers advantage in the box (this time seven on six).
This isn’t a finesse play. Montrell Johnson gets out on the edge and is a lead blocker for Wilson, meaning Florida now has equal numbers and Gibson has to navigate traffic to get back in the play. He is able to do just that and brings Wilson down before he can get the first down. This is a spectacular play by Gibson that he probably makes maybe 20 percent of the time.
Of course, a QB sneak in this position probably delivers more than 80 percent, so I get why fans would be upset at the call.
Drive 4
And this might be why Florida didn’t run a QB sneak on drive three. The first thing is we should acknowledge that this is a full yard, not just inches. Had Mertz (or Lagway) run this sneak on the previous drive and held onto the ball, it would have been a first down.
The other thing to take into account is that Montrell Johnson had runs of 23, 6 and 13 yards. I had just texted Gator Dave to tell him what an impressive drive this was. I didn’t realize I had the power to jinx the team.
The first thing to notice is that Tennessee has two corners in man-coverage on the outside receivers and a safety five-yards deep in the end zone. That means Tennessee has a one-man numbers advantage up-front (eight on seven).
I’ve highlighted the defensive tackles for Tennessee because they push both center Jake Slaughter (#66) and left guard Kamryn Waites (#75) back into Mertz. Again, Florida should be able to get a push to get a yard, whether it’s Mertz, Lagway or Johnson. The fact that they couldn’t at key moments is a reason that Napier felt the need to get cute at times.
Drive 5
This is the drive that really encompasses the entire Napier era.
The Florida defense got an interception and a personal foul after the play put the ball at Tennessee’s 11-yard line with 1:11 left on the clock. After all the screw-ups, all the poor calls and poor play, Florida was going to still have a chance to punch one in at the end of the half.
But let’s break down the entire sequence to break down why the Gators didn’t score and left even more points out on the field.
First-and-10/15:
Immediately after the turnover, Florida’s left guard Kamryn Waites flinched, moving the Gators back five yards. Mertz then attempted a tough pass out into the flat to Johnson and the ball went through his hands with 1:08 left on the clock.
Second-and-15:
This is where things started to go off the rails. With the clock stopped and 1:08 left, Florida called its last timeout. But why did Florida call this timeout?
I think it was because the Gators were going to get called for an illegal formation. Both Chimere Dike and Elijhah Badger were on the line of scrimmage. Had they stayed in that formation, Dike would have been an ineligible receiver. Had Dike moved into the backfield, Florida wouldn’t have had seven guys on the line of scrimmage.
When we finally got back to play, Florida threw a tunnel screen to Tre Wilson for a gain of one. Wilson was tackled with 1:04 on the clock.
Third-and-14:
Mertz spent a ton of time getting everyone lined-up and changing the play. The ball was then snapped with 28 second left (36 seconds after Wilson was tackled). Tennessee brought six defenders on a blitz and got to Mertz, bringing him down.
The defense was on Mertz too quickly for him to escape and throw the ball away. However, the coaching point here – and something a sixth-year senior should know – is that intentional grounding is way better than a sack here.
It comes with a 10-second runoff, but it gives your field goal unit time to get on the field. But Mertz went down, which meant Florida had to rush to get the field goal off because it didn’t have any timeouts left.
Fourth-and-24:
Napier said in the post-game press conference that there was a miscommunication about an injured player who stayed on the field and so the Gators got an illegal substitution penalty. Because the clock was running, they couldn’t stop a 10-second run-off and the half ended without a field goal attempt.
I can’t think of a more Billy Napier penalty to cost Florida a game than an illegal substitution penalty. The fact that it came after a false start, a timeout blown because of an illegal formation with a stopped clock, a 36-second play that gained one yard and a sack just makes it even more apropos.
Takeaway
I would say that the end of the first half was the most Napier-ey moment of the game, but we still had overtime to come.
This is the screen pass on second-and-15 (after another false start penalty) that went for a five-yard loss. Florida has this set up perfectly. Elijhah Badger (#6) is headed right to the middle linebacker and Tennessee’s defensive end (Bryson Eason, #20) has two offensive linemen in front of him (Brandon Crenshaw-Dickson and Damieon George).
But neither George or Crenshaw-Dickson blocks Eason. He then runs right towards Jadan Baugh and hits him before he has any chance to make a move. You can see at the end of the video where Crenshaw-Dickson points at George like he expected him to take Eason.
Billy Napier came to town saying his teams gained an advantage with him calling plays because it allowed him to have two offensive line coaches. And in overtime of a game he absolutely had to have – after his OL had just committed another critical false start – they then proceeded to not block a defensive lineman on a screen pass.
If it was just this play, or even a grouping of plays, I wouldn’t place all the blame on Napier. And you could blame Crenshaw-Dickson or George for this play. Or you could blame Dike or Badger for the illegal formation. Or you could blame Mertz for taking the sack or fumbling the ball on the QB sneak. Or you could blame Lagway for his interception or the offensive line for false starts, or the special teams coach for not having enough men on the field and getting a penalty on the opening kickoff of the second half to pin Lagway deep.
But this is what happens every week for Napier. There are misplays, mistakes, and wasted opportunities all over the place that don’t happen for other, better coached, teams. That’s just the reality and it showed again against the Vols.
Napier’s now 1-9 against Florida’s rivals. With a bye week after next week’s game against Kentucky, I’d be surprised if he gets an opportunity to go 1-10.
Best Wishes Mertz
I’ve been about as critical as anyone of Graham Mertz. I’ve wanted D.J. Lagway to play and play often this year and was still pining for him on X during the half. But you can’t help but feel for Mertz after he went out with a non-contact injury on a touchdown pass in the second half.
I like Graham Mertz the person. It can’t be easy to be the starter and share time with a true freshman. They were telling stories on the broadcast of him rooming with Lagway and how those two make the dual QB situation work. Mertz broke his collarbone plowing over a Missouri defender last year in a key situation and now looks to be seriously injured as he lofted a TD pass to put the Gators up by 10.
Mertz has showed nothing but class throughout. He said all the right things when Florida was struggling last year and had them in position to win games against Arkansas and Missouri last year if not for the defense. He’s said all the right things as part of his job has been carved into by Lagway. I have no doubt he’ll say all the right things now that it looks like it is Lagway’s job moving forward.
I’m excited about seeing where that goes, but I’m also thankful for Mertz. He hasn’t won as many games as we have wanted and he isn’t getting a statue in Gainesville, but anyone who gives it their all for the Gators and handles themselves with class should have our respect. I appreciate how much he has accomplished given his pedigree when he came from Wisconsin and he became a better player than I thought he would be.
You never wish for an injury and I don’t in this case as well. I wish Mertz the best as he recovers, and am thankful he was a Gator.