It was a nice winter’s day when the two men stepped into the sun at one of the entrances that lead downstairs at the Swamp. They were waiting for a press conference where Urban Meyer would be introduced as the Florida football coach.
But before that would happen, Meyer and Dan Mullen wanted to stand there and look at the stadium, visions of championships dancing in their heads. This was where they would make history happen.
And they did and the success flowed for those two coaches, even after they split up. Who could have predicted what would happen to both of them in 2021?
That moment has always stuck with me because I was sitting in the bleachers waiting to go to the third floor for the presser that day in late 2004. I thought about it a lot this year when I wasn’t binge-watching “The Mandalorian” or hammering out stories (“semi-retired”) or enjoying the two-TV set up in my office.
We thought 2020 in a full-blown pandemic was strange, but 2021 made a pretty good run at it.
The year has passed and most Gator fans are happy to see it go. It wasn’t what they hoped for, but there were some highlights.
Here are the top 10 stories of the year involving Gator sports for the year that was.