It has been a long time since Florida football last lost three in a row to the Kentucky Wildcats but after seven decades of futility for the Big Blue, that stretch ended on Saturday afternoon at Kroger Field. Both teams were perceived as evenly matched coming into the game, but the 33-14 whipping the Gators received proved the prognosticators wrong.
After the dust settled on Saturday, USA TODAY Sports’ Dan Wolken presented his weekly misery index column, which unfortunately included the Orange and Blue following Week 5. He offered a loquacious explanation for Florida’s presence on the list.
“Life in America changed a lot between 1987 and 2017,” Wolken starts off. “Think about six U.S. presidents, all the wars, the economic recessions, the rise of the Internet and the ability to go from rotary phones to computers that fit in our pockets. And yet in all of that time, the Florida Gators never lost a football game to Kentucky. Even though Florida was often great during that span and Kentucky was usually bad, it’s difficult to conceive of 31 consecutive wins in any annual sports rivalry.
“But now it seems like we’ve gotten to the point where Kentucky wins this game and everyone just … shrugs,” he continued. “That’s a problem for Florida, and specifically for coach Billy Napier, who fell to 0-2 against the Wildcats after a 33-14 loss in Lexington. You can’t normalize this if you’re the Gators, but the reality is Kentucky has won four of the last six meetings in this series.
“That means Kentucky, for now, is just a better program than Florida. Maybe that’s hard to swallow for fans who watched Steve Spurrier and Urban Meyer win national championships, but it’s true. And Napier, who is 9-9 at Florida since dominating the Sun Belt conference at Louisiana-Lafayette, hasn’t demonstrated anything yet to soothe concerns that he’s in over his head at this level.
“Florida isn’t the SEC’s easiest or best job, but it’s one where even Will Muschamp and Jim McElwain won 10 games within their first two seasons. Florida fans turned quickly on those guys, too. So if Napier is really building something, he needs to show it soon or else he won’t even get that much benefit of the doubt.”
Next up for the Orange and Blue are the Vanderbilt Commodores, who come to Ben Hill Griffin Stadium on Saturday, Oct. 7, for the school’s homecoming game. Kickoff is slated for 4 p.m. EDT and the game can be watched on the SEC Network.
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